


life fades (but you remain)

by peacefrog



Category: The Magicians (TV)
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Anal Sex, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Eliot Waugh's Canonically Huge Dick, Everybody Lives, Fix-It, Grief/Mourning, Happily Ever After, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Suicide, M/M, Oral Sex, Resurrection, Romance, Suicidal Thoughts, eventually, idiots to lovers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-06
Updated: 2020-01-16
Packaged: 2021-02-26 07:27:42
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 62,735
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21689860
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/peacefrog/pseuds/peacefrog
Summary: Eliot’s pain was a hollow thing. For weeks during his recovery he’d been too numb to feel it, the emptiness growing inside, but once he finally could he’d spent a not insignificant amount of time wondering if the Monster had taken his shade. It made sense, sort of, aside from all those times that he couldn’t stop crying. It was like someone had come along and scraped out all the goodness he’d had left. There was nothing now. Just a deep, pulsing blackness where once there had been so much light.aka the one where Eliot is so desperate to bring Quentin back he's willing to do almost anything, even if that means losing himself in the process. Canon divergent after 4x13.
Relationships: Alice Quinn & Eliot Waugh, Eliot Waugh/Original Male Character(s), Margo Hanson & Eliot Waugh, Quentin Coldwater/Eliot Waugh
Comments: 140
Kudos: 418





	1. Gone

**Author's Note:**

> Before we begin, I need to send the biggest shout out ever to my RAO fam for literally holding my hand every step of the way with this one. Without your love and encouragement and constant screaming over this when it was a total mess in rough draft form being fed to you in snippets over the course of several months, I never ever would have had hope of finishing. I love you all more than words can say.
> 
> Okay. So. This is... going to be a journey. Please mind the tags. The first half of this fic is very sad and goes to some pretty dark places, but I promise it's going to matter in the end. And that it will all work out. And that Quentin Coldwater will live and he and Eliot Waugh will live happily ever after. Writing this was a very personal thing for me, and I hope those of you who decide to stick around until the end will find it as cathartic to read as it was for me to create.
> 
> Originally inspired by 5x03 filming spoilers, this fic is complete and is around 60k words total split into seven chapters, which I will post once per week on Fridays. The final chapter will post on January 17th if all goes according to plan.
> 
> p.s. when reading just assume the whole 300 years into the future in Fillory thing never happened, and also at least one other thing that happened in 4x13 that will become obvious once the story progresses a bit more, because in this house canon is merely a suggestion.

Eliot trudged along in his heavy boots, blood pounding in his ears in time with his steps, Alice trailing closely behind. After six weeks of strict bed rest, Margo giving him hell any time he so much as thought about braving the stairs to the second floor of the penthouse, his whole body ached from disuse. 

It was as though he’d been shattered, pieced back together with pins and glue in all the wrong places. But now that he’d managed to, at last, fight back against the strange magic that had inhabited the wound from Margo’s axe, there was only one thing on his mind. The only thing he’d thought of, day and night, during all those weeks spent languishing in bed.

The evening light was sallow, a sickly yellow that Eliot felt like a film in all the places his skin was exposed. The air was heavy with a mist common in this part of Fillory, on this mountain which Eliot hadn’t bothered to visit even once in his time as High King. He only knew of its existence because of a single late night conversation with Benedict, and though at the time he’d only been half-listening, he’d heard enough for it to come back to him when it finally mattered.

“Why are we really here, Eliot?” Alice broke the silence that had been stretching between them for what felt like miles.

“I told you. Someone here might be able to help us get—”

“Margo unbanished? Yeah. You said that already.”

Eliot sighed with his entire body. “So then why are you asking again?”

“Because you’re full of shit.”

Eliot stopped in his tracks, kicking up a spray of crumbling stone under his feet. “You really want to do this when we’re three-quarters of the way up a mountain?”

Alice cocked an eyebrow. “I just want you to tell me the truth.”

Eliot frowned, averting his gaze. “I would have come by myself, Alice, but I need you… to help.”

“To help with what?” she asked, incredulous, like she already knew the answer.

“There’s a spell. I can’t do it. Please don’t ask me why. It’s not hard, a couple words said into a mirror in a particular spot and—”

When Eliot finally braved a look at her face, the pity in her eyes made his stomach turn. “Eliot, just tell me why—”

He turned away, started moving again. “We should keep going if we want to make it back down before dark.”

Eliot couldn’t say the words. He was a coward, truth be told. Always had been. But hey, at least he knew who he was, all the way down to his rotten core, and that was more than he could say for most people. There was no point in lying to himself any longer. It was better this way. Just keep moving. Just keep running. Eventually, he knew, he might get lucky enough to meet up with the end of his rope.

Alice had to half-jog to keep up with his stride. “Do you want to talk about him?”

Eliot couldn’t keep the venom from his voice. “Talk about who, Alice?”

“You know who I mean. Don’t act like you don’t.”

Of course he knew. Eliot could feel his face burning hot with emotion. “No. I don’t want to talk about who you mean.”

The path to the summit was twisted and narrow, dotted with a soft, blue-green moss so dense it might have been the fur of some hulking, thick-backed animal under their feet. The mountains of this range were stubby things, not so steep as they were jagged and unpredictable, and Alice had suggested halfway up that it might be easier just to magic themselves the rest of the way. “I’m shit at it but I know you can fly,” she’d said. “I’ve seen you do it before. I can just hop on your back or something.”

She might have been joking, but Eliot was too exhausted to even consider flying. And exhaustion aside, the magic that was left in him was some pitiful little spark. Barely even a flicker. He’d tried a hundred spells since his recovery and not a single one had worked.

Eliot Waugh would never fly again. 

Magic comes from pain, he’d said, so many times before, but some pains are too great for even magic to feed off of. Some pains aren’t meant to be used as fuel to burn.

Eliot’s pain was a hollow thing. For weeks during his recovery he’d been too numb to feel it, the emptiness growing inside, but once he finally could, he’d spent a not insignificant amount of time wondering if the Monster had taken his shade. It made sense, sort of, aside from all those times that he couldn’t stop crying. It was like someone had come along and scraped out all the goodness he’d had left. There was nothing now. Just a deep, pulsing blackness where once there had been so much light.

But as the days went on, he knew he couldn’t keep lying to himself. He knew what this was, the only thing that it could be. Quentin had died, and that had been enough. That had been enough to destroy him. And Eliot was destroyed, of that there could be no doubt. He did his best to hide it away from the scant few people still left in his life, but he could feel the facade that he’d so carefully crafted slipping more with each passing day.

“Okay. Fine,” Alice said after a few long minutes of plodding along in silence. “I know why we’re here. I just thought I’d give you a chance to be honest with me first.”

Eliot didn’t respond. The path before them had begun to even out a little, the terrain changing along with the air. They were getting close to the summit.

“I came here when I was a niffin. There’s nowhere in Fillory I haven’t seen, Eliot. I know what you think you’re going to find, but it isn’t going to work.”

Eliot clenched his jaw, wrenching around to face her. They froze, and for a moment all they could do was gaze sadly into each other’s eyes. “You don’t know that it won’t work,” Eliot said, voice breaking. “Maybe there were things you didn’t see.”

“I saw everything!” Her voice trembled in a way that said she hadn’t meant to shout. “I saw everything,” she repeated, quieter this time. “And that’s how I know. Don’t you think I want to see him too? Do you understand how badly I—”

“Spare me your widow’s grief, okay?” Eliot spun on his heels and continued on, the path under his boots now more flat plain than mountain, the mossy giant giving way to grass. “Sad little magic girl. No one could ever understand her pain.”

“Why are you being such a prick to me, Eliot? I didn’t do anything. I’m trying to help you. If you would just—”

The summit of the mountain lay suddenly before them, flat as an open field, like the hand of Ember himself had come down and shorn the top clean off. Distant, skeletal trees spread themselves up toward the endless sky, like the shadows of finger bones choked in the mist. Eliot could just make out the shape of the sun through the haze, dipping toward the horizon. He took in a lungful of damp air and slowly let it out.

“They don’t call it Ghost Mountain for the reason you think,” Alice said, gripping Eliot’s sleeve. “If you’ll just listen to me. For one second...”

Eliot tugged himself out of her grasp. “Benedict said—”

“Benedict was wrong.”

Her words hung heavy in the air, thick as fog and bitter as poison. Eliot stayed silent, staring into the gloomy distance, at the skeletal branches he could just barely make out on the mountain’s edge, waiting for her to continue.

“If you won’t talk about him, I will.”

Eliot knew who she meant, but he couldn’t help himself. “Benedict?”

“Quentin.”

The air was so heavy now, Eliot thought he might choke. Seven letters. Two syllables. “Don’t say his name.”

Alice stepped out in front, daring him to look away. “Don’t you dare. Don’t you dare pretend that—”

Eliot was drowning, choking, going under. “Don’t worry, Alice. I’m not pretending anything. You get to grieve out loud, and say his name, and hear from everyone around you how sorry they are that you lost the love of your life, and I—”

Eliot shut his eyes, heart fluttering in his chest, and forced himself to breathe. He was going to tumble over and down the edge of the mountain and never stop falling, falling, falling if he didn’t just… 

Stop. Breathe.

“Forget it,” he said, his lungs working overtime. “If you’re not going to help me do this spell, you can just go.”

“Well you might as well come with me, because you said yourself that you can’t do it.” She crossed her arms in defiance. “You don’t just get to say something like that and pretend it didn’t happen.”

“I don’t know what you want me to say, Alice. I came here so that maybe…” Eliot’s voice quavered, timid and small, a shapeless memory of itself. “Maybe I could see him again. It’s all that I want, okay? I don’t have anything else.”

Up until that moment, Eliot had been certain that she knew. It was practically dripping off of him like a perfume. How had she not picked up on the scent? But now, the realization on her face was unmistakable. The final piece of the puzzle had clicked into place at last. 

“You were in love with him.”

Eliot shivered under his heavy jacket. “He never told you. About the mosaic.”

Alice gave him a curious look. “Where you got the third key?”

“Yeah.”

She shook her head. “There wasn’t any time. So much was happening, and then...”

Eliot sighed. “Right. Of course. It doesn’t matter anyway.”

“Of course it matters. Eliot, talk to me.”

Eliot threw his hands up and frowned at her. “Will you help me do the spell or not?”

She gazed at him sadly, a thousand unspoken words reflected in her eyes. “Fine,” she relented after a moment. “Hand it over.”

Eliot reached into his jacket pocket, pulling out a silver compact mirror he’d found in the penthouse’s master suite, its outside etched with tiny, intricate flowers. Alice snatched it from his hand and clicked it open, holding it out at arm’s length.

“You have to say—”

“I know what to say.”

“And you have to—”

“I know how to do it, Eliot, which is how I know it’s not going to work.”

Eliot resisted the urge to spit out something terribly cruel, stepping back to watch over her shoulder. From this angle he could see the shadowy trees and the fog reflected eerily behind them as Alice began to recite the words, an ancient Fillorian tongue that sounded just as alien as it was. She did a series of tuts with her free hand and held up her index finger rod-straight until a thin line of blue light shot from her fingertip into the mirror.

The light died out, and everything around them went quiet and still. Eliot stood and waited and gazed unblinking into the mirror, his foot tapping out an anxious rhythm, his whole body trembling and cold. As the legend went, according to Benedict, reciting this spell into a mirror on the summit of Ghost Mountain would summon the spirit of your beloved deceased.

“And then you just turn around and... there they are,” Benedict had said. They’d both been a little drunk and Eliot hadn’t asked for specifics, but he’d managed to dig up the spell with a little help from Fen after fielding several dozen uncomfortable questions about what he planned on doing with it and how he planned on climbing a mountain after having just recovered from taking a magical axe to the gut.

“Eliot,” Alice said very quietly, not yet daring to move the mirror. “It’s not—”

“Just one more minute.”

“I’m gonna put my hand down now, okay?” Alice’s voice was barely a whisper, but on the quiet of the mountain it rattled his ears.

“Alice.” Eliot’s broken voice was the most pathetic sound. “Please.”

She sighed and looked back at him over her shoulder. “Eliot, I’m sorry,” she said softly.

Alice’s voice was pity all the way down, but before Eliot could even think to wallow in it she lowered the mirror, and he swore in that moment that his eyes caught a flash of something familiar. The shape of a hand, the bowed lips of a mouth, open and screaming. It came through like a double-exposure, something trapped in the film of the air and caught only for a fraction of a second in the mist-filtered light.

“Did you see that?” Eliot was breathless as Alice handed the mirror back to him. “Tell me that you saw that.”

“Eliot.” He wished she would just stop saying his name. “Let’s go home.”

Eliot’s whole body was shaking, his feet cemented to the mountain below. “Why did you even agree to come up here with me in the first place, hm? You knew I was lying. You knew. So why even bother?”

“Because I was hoping that you would finally talk to me if I came. Since you got back you won’t even look at me. And when you asked me to come I’d hoped that maybe you were finally opening up. I just thought that—”

“You thought what? That we would come up here and bond over the loss of your boyfriend and and then suddenly everything would be okay? Well it’s not, Alice. It’s not fucking okay.” A single tear fell from each of Eliot’s eyes, warm on his cool skin. “You know what, just get the fuck out of here. Just go.”

Eliot bunched his hands into fists at his side, watching Alice open her mouth and then close it without speaking. When she finally found her words, he thought she might start crying right along with him. “I’ll go,” she said. “If you’re so determined to push everyone who cares about you so far away. But I just want you to ask yourself how Quentin would feel to see you acting this way before I do. Because if you ask me... he’d be pretty fucking ashamed.”

She spun on her heels and disappeared into the mist without so much as glancing over her shoulder. He could hear her boots clattering distantly as she found her way back to the path and began the slow descent down the mountain. He could only stand there quaking after she’d gone, hugging his arms around himself loosely as salty tears trailed down his cheeks, depositing themselves onto his lips.

He thought very seriously about sitting down and never moving again. Losing himself to the mist had a certain appeal. Maybe with his help Ghost Mountain would finally live up to its name.

Eliot tucked the mirror into one pocket and pulled his flask out of another, taking a long pull that burned all the way down to his toes. He pulled out a cigarette and smoked it down to the filter before turning away from the flat earth of the summit, making his way back down the mountain shivering and cold and alone.

—

Eliot sprawled on the throne that had once belonged to him and tossed back another mouthful of overly-sweet Fillorian wine. As the hours passed it had started to feel mechanical, the way his body moved: Pour the wine, drink the wine, lather, rinse, repeat. 

Fen shot him a tight smile, and a look that said nothing short of, _why the hell are you sitting on my throne?_ “Are you staying?”

“Not for long.” Eliot refilled his goblet and shot back half the contents in one long swig. “I just need to do some research. And then I’ll be on my way.”

“More research? Did the spell that we found not work? I’d heard the legend but wasn’t sure if, you know...”

Eliot slurped down the rest of his wine and stumbled to his feet, the goblet clattering from his hand to the floor. “It doesn’t matter. I’ll be in the library, Your Majesty, and then I’ll be out of your hair.”

He gave her an exaggerated, off-kilter bow and staggered away. Walking—stumbling, whatever—into the library, Eliot realized at once he was far too drunk to know where to begin. Why hadn’t he implemented a proper cataloging system in all his time as king? He wobbled between shelves, dragging his fingers along the colorful spines, the world going fuzzy at the edges.

When he spotted Rafe tucked away in a corner, reading—slowly, very, very slowly—to Abigail the sloth, Eliot actually laughed. “Rafe. Oh thank fuck you’re here. Look, I need a book. Well, five books?” Eliot held onto the wall to keep himself from tipping over. “I need five books, Rafe, and it’s urgent.”

Rafe looked from the sloth to Eliot and gave him a little smile. “Your Maj—Eliot,” he corrected, rising from his chair. “I would be happy to help you. Which books exactly are you looking for?”

“Christopher Plover. You know the ones.” Eliot clapped Rafe on the shoulder. “I’m gonna go sit down.”

There was a window seat overlooking the bay and Eliot tumbled down into it, fixing himself upright and pulling out his pack of cigarettes. He fumbled with his lighter, wishing for magic, for the spark in the core of his belly to roll up from his fingers and bring his soul to life. He inhaled, exhaled, knocked his head back against the wall.

He’d nearly nodded off, cigarette dangling from his lips, when Rafe came over and deposited the entirety of the Fillory and Further series at his feet. 

Eliot blinked himself awake, ash falling down onto his shirt. “You always were my favorite, Rafe, you know that?”

Rafe gave him a sad little smile. “Is everything all right?”

Eliot puffed his cigarette and laughed out a thin wisp of smoke. “Rafe, I can’t say this to anyone back on Earth, and certainly not to my High King ex-wife, but I don’t think I’ve ever felt worse than I do right now.”

“This is about… what happened to Quentin.”

“Yep,” he said without hesitation. “Did you know that I was in love with him?” It felt good just to let it out. The wine had loosened his tongue, and all the things that he could never say to anyone because they were too close suddenly came tumbling free. “I don’t think anyone does. Maybe Margo, but she doesn’t know the details so she doesn’t understand. And, well, Alice, but she… really doesn’t understand. She thinks she loved him more than me. Maybe she’s right.”

“Eliot.” Rafe perched on the far end of the window seat, like he was approaching a wounded animal. “I am so sorry for your loss.”

“You know... you’re the first person to say that to me.”

His words sat heavily on the air, and for a moment they sat in silence while Eliot took a deep drag from his cigarette, holding it in until it burned.

Rafe reached forward, resting a hand on Eliot’s ankle, gently, as though he were afraid he might be bitten, and shot him a look so full of pity that Eliot wanted to hide away. “I should… let you get to your reading.”

A terrible shame took hold of him then, and Eliot averted his gaze. “Yes. Thank you.”

Rafe pulled away and rose to his feet. “You will let me know if you need anything else?”

“Yes.” He puffed on his cigarette with trembling fingers. Why couldn’t he have just kept his big fucking mouth shut? “I will. Thank you, Rafe.”

Rafe made his exit, and Eliot gazed out the window and across the windy bay, an ache gnawing something terrible at the center of his chest. Distantly, white-capped waves dashed themselves against the sharp peaks of rocks that looked like tiny mountains rising from the water. If he listened carefully, he could hear the cries of birds as they circled high above the castle, hungry for whatever the sea saw fit to toss their way.

He stubbed out his cigarette and turned his attention to the pile of books at his feet. It’s what he would have done, Eliot knew, as he took the copy of _The World in the Walls_ in his hands and flipped it open. He read the book cover-to-cover without moving from his seat, chain smoking cigarettes until his pack was empty and taking long swigs from his bottomless flask. 

There was nothing in _The World in the Walls_ about Ghost Mountain, and when he was finished his back ached and his legs were painfully stiff and he had to piss something awful. 

He stumbled down the hall to the latrine, and when he returned to the library there was a tray of fresh fruit and bread and a pitcher of water waiting by his seat. Good old Rafe. Eliot hadn’t even considered eating for what he was pretty certain had been an entire day, and all it took was the sight of food to set his mouth watering and his stomach twisting itself into ravenous knots.

Fillorian strawberries were nothing like the strawberries on Earth. They were too sweet, Eliot thought, but he gobbled them down one after the next, licking the juice from his fingers before setting his sights on the hunk of crusty bread. He polished off the contents of the tray in a manner entirely unbefitting a former High King of Fillory, though he supposed he was probably the first person in all of Fillorian history to actually live to claim that title. 

He drank water straight from the pitcher and when he was finished he collapsed down onto the seat again, taking a swig from his flask to top off his full belly. He was just about to reach for _The Girl Who Told Time_ when footfalls on cold stone announced that he had company.

The world outside the window was growing dark, and the castle’s illumination spells were just starting to kick in, framing Alice in a warm amber glow. “There you are,” she said. “I was starting to worry.”

Eliot let his head knock back against the wall with a sigh. “Why on Earth or Fillory would you be worried about me?”

“Because I still give a shit about you even if you’re being a massive dick, Eliot. Whether you like it or not.”

She sat down next to the stack of books and Eliot held out his flask. “Drink?”

“No,” she said without looking up. She was holding the copy of _The Secret Sea_ in her hands, studying the cover with a frown. “You’re reading the Fillory books.”

“I’m reading the Fillory books.” Eliot reached for his cigarettes before remembering he’d smoked the last one hours ago. “You wouldn’t happen to have a smoke…”

“You should take better care of yourself.” She flipped open the cover of the book. “You’re still trying to find something, aren’t you? About Ghost Mountain? You think I got the spell wrong.”

“I think…” Eliot swallowed down the urge to be cruel. “I think it’s worth it to consider that maybe we missed something. I know you think I’ve lost my shit, Alice, but I saw something when we were up there, okay? I saw…”

Alice looked up from the book and frowned. He couldn’t imagine what she must think of him, but did it even matter anymore? She was stronger than he would ever be. “I can read a lot faster than you,” she said, taking him off guard. “It’ll go quicker if you let me help.”

Eliot looked at her for a long moment, trying to find the words and coming up short each time. Even if she were only humoring him, he decided he should take it. He flipped open _The Girl Who Told Time_ and started reading, his aching eyes demanding he take it slow.

Rupert and Martin and Jane. The Watcherwoman and her clocks. The words droned on and on. Christopher Plover couldn’t write prose for shit. He was thankful, at least, that this wasn’t the book that featured those few brief lines about Jane’s visit to the mosaic, and the old man she’d met there who’d finished it just before her arrival.

By the time Eliot was finished with _The Girl Who Told Time_ , Alice had made it through the remaining three books. It was fully dark outside when he lifted his eyes to her. “Anything?”

“Nothing. You?”

“Nope. So.” Eliot tossed the book carelessly to the floor. “Fuck.”

“I’m sorry,” she said, “I know you—”

“I saw him,” Eliot said firmly, tears stinging in his eyes. “I saw—”

“You haven’t been sleeping, you haven’t—”

“Don’t”

“You should get some sleep,” she said, carefully, quietly, and Eliot resented her pity. “We both should. I’ll send a bunny for Twenty-Three in the morning so we can go home.”

Home. Eliot wanted to laugh but was too exhausted. The kind of exhaustion that slips under your skin and tugs at your marrow until you’re certain your body is going to turn itself inside out. But he didn’t want to sleep, and he didn’t want Twenty-Three to ferry them back to Earth, and he didn’t even particularly want to stay in Fillory. Unless—

“Jane had that watch.” The words came slipping out before Eliot had time to consider what he was saying. “The one she used to reset the timelines. Start us all over again.”

“Eliot…”

“The dwarves made it for her. Maybe they could make another.”

“That watch needed the time key to work.”

Eliot sucked down a lungful of air and shut his eyes. “I know what key it took. I don’t need you to remind me.”

“Even if you could convince the dwarves to work their magic for you, Eliot, the watch wouldn’t work. Jane’s… it was the only one. Time magic isn’t something that’s just handed to you.”

Eliot opened his eyes, gazed out into the blackness beyond the window. “If I could just go back to before The Monster. If I hadn’t… fired that gun. Maybe…”

“You were just trying to save him. You think I don’t have regrets about what I did that day too?”

“You’re not the reason he’s dead, Alice.” Eliot took a long pull from his flask. It was funny, he thought, how you could fill your body up with so many things, yet come away emptier than when you started. “I think I’ll go to bed now,” he said flatly, pulling himself unsteadily to his feet. 

“Eliot,” Alice said when he turned his back. “Wait.”

“Goodnight, Alice,” he said over his shoulder. “I don’t think I said it before, but… I’m sorry for your loss.”

Drunk on whisky and exhaustion and grief, Eliot stumbled from the library and down a twisting labyrinth of wide stone corridors, the illuminated orbs suspended overhead lighting his path. He passed High King Fen’s private bed chambers, nearly colliding with one of the guards stationed outside the door. It had been his bedroom once, long ago, and they his guards, but when he tried to remember how that had felt the memories slipped from him like water through his hands.

Eliot took a pull from his flask and realized he had no idea where he was going. He found a spot away from the guards and slumped down under an orb, glowing radiantly above his head like a miniature sun. 

He took one drink and then another, knocking back his flask until he was numb. He nodded off with his chin against his chest and blackness swirling in his mind, coming to with a jolt when something made contact with his foot.

It was Rafe, nudging him gently, his face swimming in Eliot’s vision when he opened his heavy eyes. “Eliot,” he said, kneeling down beside him. “Is everything all right?”

“No,” was what came out when Eliot tried to speak, his tongue like concrete in his mouth. “Everything… is shit, Rafe. And I can’t remember where my room is.”

He reached for him, grabbing Eliot firmly by the arm. “Can you stand? Come on, I’ll help you find it.”

Poor Rafe nearly toppled over helping Eliot maneuver his long legs into something that resembled a vertical position. He looped his arm in Eliot’s arm and began leading him back down the hall.

“This used to be my castle,” Eliot said, wobbling a little as Rafe led them down a squat set of stairs. “And Margo’s. And…”

Even thinking his name felt like a bad idea. Thinking of thinking of his name was bad enough. Thinking of his face, under the haze of sleep deprivation and alcohol, felt entirely unavoidable. He’d been beautiful. Jesus, how beautiful he’d been. Radiant as the goddamn sun, hiding behind all that hair like he didn’t even know it. And the taste of his lips, the warmth of his skin… 

Tears were pricking hotly in Eliot’s eyes by the time Rafe had them standing outside the door to his room. “Here we are,” he said, releasing his hold on Eliot’s arm. “Remember now?”

“Yes.” Eliot hid his face as he reached for the latch. “Yes, of course. I must have gotten myself turned around somehow.”

“I am happy that I could help. If you need anything you’ll—”

Eliot pushed open the door. “Yes. I will. Thank you. Goodnight, Rafe.”

“Goodnight,” Rafe said quietly, and Eliot shut the door.

Illumination spells kicked on when he entered, turning darkness into a warmth that Eliot ached to feel under his skin. He shrugged off his jacket and kicked out of his shoes, realizing only then that he was still dressed exactly as he’d been on the mountain the previous day. If he’d slept at all the night before he hadn’t bothered getting undressed. He’d been so drunk he could hardly remember. He was so drunk now certainly all of this tomorrow would be but a blur.

He tipped back his flask again and then tossed it down onto the bed. He unbuttoned his shirt and shrugged it off onto the floor, catching a glimpse of himself in the ornate mirror that was mounted on the back of the door. He approached his reflection slowly. Jesus, his face was a wreck.

He hadn’t bothered shaving since regaining control of his body, and the bags under his eyes aged him ten years at least. And he really fucking needed a shower, and to do something with his filthy, matted hair. Eliot scrubbed a hand down his face and began to turn away, but a shadow reflected in his periphery caused him to turn back to the mirror with a gasp.

It was gone in a flash, just as it had appeared on the mountain, but Eliot knew that face. He would know it anywhere, in darkness or in daylight, fragmented and for but a fleeting fraction of a second. Even as drunk as he was, it was there. He had seen it. Eliot’s heartbeat rattled his bones. 

He allowed himself the luxury of thinking of his name, just the once, and only for a moment. _Quentin_. It slipped through his mind like a prayer, and then he locked it away. But the shadow of his reflection remained. Eliot stood there staring in the mirror until his eyes began to burn.

He forced himself to look away. What he needed more than anything was to not be upright anymore. He finished undressing and crawled under the covers, trembling from somewhere deep in his bones. 

His drunken, tired brain tried grasping at any thread of logic once he was settled. _Maybe you just miss him that much. Maybe you are just losing your mind. You’re a sloppy, drunken mess. What did you expect to happen?_

Eliot groaned and tried to empty his mind, lying still in protest of his racing thoughts, and after a while the illumination spells got the message. They lowered themselves down to a flicker, and then extinguished themselves entirely, like a candle blowing out and welcoming the night

In the dark Eliot could see his face, picking it out from among the shadows in the corner of the room. And when he shut his eyes, he swore he could feel the weight of another body there with him on the bed. The weight of another body pressing down on top of him.

He thought of his hands, his hair, his face, his parted mouth. Fuck, how he craved his skin. Those sweet lips moaning against his lips in the dark. He thought of touching himself but knew there was no way he was going to get hard tonight. Instead, he lay there breathing and shaking and wanting in silence, hoping against all hope for dreams to come.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I feel like I should apologize for dropping 5.5k of angst on y'all and then just being like lol see you next week. But listen. I promise this is going to get better we're just... going to have to suffer a little more first. Next week's chapter is a big one (around 13k) and will introduce an OC that I swear I'm going to write an original story for some day. He's just that amazing (and also kind of terrible).
> 
> See y'all next Friday, and if you wanna yell at me on twitter or tumblr in the meantime you can find me [here](https://twitter.com/gruntsandpoetry) and [here](http://lizardkingeliot.tumblr.com). <3


	2. Roland

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Oh, baby…” Roland clucked his tongue. “I’m not angry. I mean, we weren’t official or anything, right? Sure, you lived in my apartment for a year and I took care of you, bought you all those expensive shirts. But it’s not like I loved you.” Roland smirked, and Eliot’s face grew hot. “I will say, though, I did love… parts of you.”

Sometime just before dawn Eliot managed to drift off into a fitful sleep. He woke two hours later with his head pounding and his mouth dry and his bladder so full it ached to move. He dressed himself and padded half-awake to the latrine and back again, finding a tray much like the one that had been left for him yesterday waiting outside his door.

He couldn’t recall a time when fruit and bread and water had ever tasted so good, and there was the Fillorian equivalent of bacon too. Eliot stuffed himself full and sat down in the chair by the window, waiting for the weight of the world to settle down over him again.

And like clockwork it found him, heavy and familiar. Like an old friend, Eliot thought, or an enemy you couldn’t be bothered to fight with anymore.

Alice showed her face soon after, knocking and then letting herself into the room a few seconds later. “I sent a bunny,” she said. “Twenty-Three should be here soon.”

He walked with her in silence out to the throne room, where Rafe and Fen and Tick were gathered talking in low voices about something he felt certain was mind-numbingly dull. Taxes or crops or whatever grievances the talking animals happened to have this week. Eliot avoided their eyes, willing his body to take up a little less space in the room. The last thing he needed right now was a lecture on self-care from his ex-wife.

He had never been happier to see any version of Penny than when Twenty-Three blipped in to whisk them back to Earth.

“You’re a life-saver, Twenty-Three,” Eliot said when they were firmly back on penthouse ground.

“I know,” he replied before blipping away.

Alice glanced at him with sad eyes and went to the kitchen. Margo jumped up from the sofa and pulled him into her arms.

“I was worried,” she said, pulling back and giving him a serious look. “But maybe I shouldn’t be. Now that you’re healed up enough to climb a mountain.”

She looked at him like he’d betrayed some vital thing that had existed between them. He hadn’t actually told her why he was going off to Fillory to begin with, but Alice must have made it back to Earth long enough to fill her in before finding him at Whitespire.

“Sorry.” He lowered himself down onto the sofa with Margo all but clinging to his side. “I didn’t wanna worry you.”

“Like hell you didn’t. You just didn’t want me giving you shit. Give me a little more credit, El.”

Eliot sighed. “I’m really tired, Bambi. Can we… talk about something else. Or, here’s an idea: let’s go find some drugs.”

She rested her head on his shoulder and threaded their fingers together. “You look like shit. I’m not letting you take anything right now.”

“Not even—”

“No.”

“Can I at least have a cigarette? I’m all out.”

She sighed and reached for her pack on the coffee table, put one in his mouth and lit it with the tips of her fingers.

Eliot took a drag. “I really miss doing that,” he said.

“Yeah.” She eyed him sadly. “You wanna talk about that? Why you can’t…”

“Get it up for magic anymore?”

“Yeah.”

He passed her the cigarette and leaned back with a sigh. “There’s nothing to talk about. Something happened, and now…”

“Something didn’t just happen, El. You were possessed by a fuckload of god-monster power and it messed you all up. Maybe there’s something we can—”

“It wasn’t The Monster that did this to me.” There it was again. His stupid fucking mouth.

“You sound pretty sure.” She passed the cigarette back and touched his face. “Talk to me.”

She wasn’t going to let this one go. Not now. He glanced over at Alice where she sat in the kitchen and then back to Margo. He took a drag and tried to get his tongue to work, but his brain shut down the words before they could hope to get that far.

Margo sat patiently at his side while he smoked down the rest of the cigarette, and when he could find no more excuses for the silence to drag on, he said, “I know that you know how I felt. About... him.”

“Yeah,” she said, reaching into his lap to take his hand. “Yeah, I know. You said some things when you were all drugged up right after you came back.”

Eliot’s cheeks started to burn. “Please never tell me what those things were.”

“It was mostly incoherent nonsense. I know there are things I don’t know. Things that happened between the two of you. I knew you’d be messed up over what happened, El. I am too. But… if I’m being honest, you’re starting to scare me.”

Fuck. Eliot needed a drink. He pulled his hand out of hers and scrubbed it over his face. “Things… happened. Yeah.”

Trying to speak the words felt impossible. It was as though some invisible hand had wrapped around his throat, threatening to squeeze his life away if he dared go any further. 

“Take your time,” Margo said, and he resented the patience dripping from her voice, and the love. He wanted to hide away from it all.

He opened his mouth but his voice wouldn’t work. _I’m pathetic. I’m a coward._ He reached for Margo’s cigarettes and she lit him another as he held it between his trembling fingers. 

“It’s okay,” she said after a while, and he didn’t know how to tell her that no, it’s not okay. It will never be okay again. “You don’t have to say anything, El. I just… I wanna help.”

“You can help by rolling a joint.”

“El.”

“What? Weed is barely a drug.” He pulled smoke deep into his lungs and let it out. “Whatever. I’ll roll it myself. It’s not like I need your permission.”

Margo glared at him. He could feel the fight begging to come out of her mouth. “You don’t get to push me away,” she said. “No fucking way, El. Not gonna happen.”

Eliot rolled it over in his mind while he smoked the cigarette down a little more. Something deep and primal in the marrow of his bones wanted nothing more than to argue. “And you don’t get to tell me what to do with my own body. There’s no law that says I have to give a shit about myself. I already have one useless mother, I don’t need—”

Margo snatched the cigarette from his hand and stubbed it out with a fury. “I’m gonna stop you right there. I know you, El, and that means I know every last one of your petty, bitchy little games. And how you spit the poison that’s growing inside you back into the faces of the people who love you most.”

Eliot’s face burned hotter by the second. He kept his eyes fixed on the far side of the room, a spot on the wallpaper, a crumbling spine of a book on a shelf, anywhere but the eyes beside him boring straight down into his shame.

“So no, I can’t stop you from doing whatever it is you’re gonna do with your body once you lock yourself away in your room. Or should I say when you lock me out?” Her knee knocked against his, trembling terribly. “But you don’t get to decide who gives a fuck about you, and who’s just trying to keep you on this side of the grave a little longer.”

Eliot swallowed and turned his eyes to the bank of windows at his side, the filtered light seeping in from the cloud-choked sky. “A joint isn’t going to kill me,” he said, sounding every bit of sixteen-years-old.

“No. But all those pills you have in that box on your dresser might. I would have flushed them when you were gone, but I know you’ll just go out and find more, so what’s the point?”

“When the fuck did you turn into an after school special? Jesus, Margo.”

“Right about the time you came back and started acting like you had a death wish. You think I don’t see it, but I’ve seen you like this before. After Mike.” She rested her hand on his arm, making him flinch. “Only this time I think you really mean it.” 

Eliot’s stomach lurched, and with great effort he pulled himself up from the sofa, all but running out onto the balcony. The air outside was sticky with the promise of rain, and he held onto the railing as he sucked down deep lungfuls of it, trying his best to not lose his breakfast all over Eighth Avenue below.

Margo didn’t follow.

Beyond the penthouse, Central Park loomed like a great green cloud. If Eliot fixed his eyes on it for long enough he might imagine he was somewhere different, though he couldn’t for the life of him think of where that place might be. Not Fillory. There was nothing left for him there, but every location on Earth that his brain tried to conjure left him feeling even emptier than before.

Maybe in some other world, then. He could go to The Neitherlands, find a fountain that looked promising, dive headlong into somewhere far away from the poison that had become his life. Even if that other world were barren and cold, Eliot thought it might be better than walking around in the constant fog of his innumerable failures and choking shame of his life on Earth.

From this height the people on the ground looked like miniatures of themselves. A miniature world where everything was always as it seemed and no one ever went away before their time. It was a very long way down, and Eliot allowed himself to feel the call of it for a fraction of a second before pulling away and slipping back inside.

Margo was in the kitchen talking with Alice, and she turned to him as he made a beeline for the door. “El. Hey. Come on. Where are you going?”

“Out. I’ll be back.”

He shut the door behind him before she had any chance to protest.

He took an Uber from the penthouse to a place in Uptown he hadn’t actually expected to find. But there it was, looking every bit the den of bottom-feeders it had been back before Brakebills had come along to whisk him away. From the outside it looked like any other bodega on the block: dirty brick with a rusted awning over the door, windows plastered over with shop advertisements beneath the thick black bars. 

The door was warded shut, and Eliot stood outside taking sips from his flask waiting for someone inside to recognize him on the security camera. The buzz startled Eliot from his numbness when it came. He slipped into the dark interior of a vestibule and was ushered through another door by a hedge he didn’t recognize. He was tall with a short crop of dark hair, and in some other life Eliot would have been flirting and making plans for him already. 

“You Eliot?” he asked as they made their way through an aisle lined with empty, rusting shelves.

“Yeah. Who’s in charge here now?”

The hedge laughed. “What? You don’t know? ‘Cause he sure seems to know you.”

Eliot’s heart gave a little start as the hedge pulled open the door to the basement. “Who exactly?”

To that he got no answer. 

They walked down the pitted, uneven steps that Eliot’s body recalled like a song. They were a memory buried muscle-deep, a life long-remembered in the tendons of his ankles and the bones of his feet. There was a slick, dangerous dip at one end of the bottom step, and Eliot avoided it on instinct.

There were a handful of people scattered at folding tables under bare bulbs doing makeshift magic and practicing Amelia Popper’s exercises. The hedge led Eliot away from them to the little office tucked away in the corner. He rapped his knuckles against the door three times and walked away, leaving Eliot there alone.

The door swung open. Eliot’s heart sank down into his shoes. 

“Eliot,” said the smiling, familiar face. “What the fuck are you doing here?” 

Eliot allowed himself to be ushered inside, the door clicking shut behind. “Roland.” He offered a tight smile. “I feel like I should be asking you the same thing.”

Roland laughed, a glint in his dark eyes. “Oh, tell me you haven’t heard? Well, with Marina gone… that makes me top bitch in New York.”

The office was barely big enough to contain his filing cabinet of stolen spells and the massive slab of oak that was his desk. Eliot pressed himself tightly back against the door, putting what little space between their bodies he could manage.

Roland unbuttoned his immaculate suit jacket and took his seat. “Eliot, Eliot, Eliot. How many years has it been?”

Eliot shrugged, his heart twisting itself into knots. “A few.”

Eliot remembered how long it had been exactly. The day he’d stumbled onto the Brakebills campus had been their last together. His scarf swept away on a sudden gust of wind, Eliot had gone chasing after it down an alleyway, and just like that, his life was changed forever. He’d only gone out to buy cigarettes, but once inside the loving embrace of the Brakebills fold, he’d had little desire to return to his life as a hedge. Or his life as Roland’s… whatever they had been.

He looked every bit the man Eliot remembered, but perhaps more confident now, sharper around the edges. His hair longer, nearly skimming his shoulders. And those eyes, dark and full of mischief, sparking amber in the light swinging above his desk. For a moment, Eliot thought, he might almost resemble—

“You know,” Roland said. “I almost didn’t recognize you. Took me a few minutes to work it out. You’ve… well, you’re not the witch you used to be, are you, Eliot?”

Eliot sighed. “I could say the same for you. How many friends did you have to fuck over to find yourself in this position?”

“Oh, there’s that mouth I love. Listen, baby, I’ve fucked plenty of friends in every position you could imagine... but I’m in this chair because I earned it.” When Eliot didn’t respond, Roland kicked his feet up on the desk and sighed. “So, tell me… where has the great Eliot Waugh been all these years?”

Eliot cleared his throat, fixing his eyes on the dirty bottoms of Roland’s otherwise pristine shoes. “It’s a long story. But I didn’t come here to—”

“Brakebills, I hear.” Roland shot him a tight smile. “Never did take you as the type. A little stuffy for your tastes, wouldn’t you say?”

Eliot bit back the venom rising in the back of his throat. “Look, I know you’re probably angry that I—”

“Oh, baby…” Roland clucked his tongue. “I’m not angry. I mean, we weren’t official or anything, right? Sure, you lived in my apartment for a year and I took care of you, bought you all those expensive shirts. But it’s not like I loved you.” Roland smirked, and Eliot’s face grew hot. “I will say, though, I did love… parts of you.”

Eliot breathed in deeply, exhaling as slowly as he could manage. “I need your help,” he said.

Roland pulled his feet down from the desk with a laugh. “If you need help, go back to your fancy school. I don’t know what help you could possibly need from a bottom feeder like me.”

Eliot pushed away from the door, crossing the short distance between them, planting his hands on the desk. “Roland,” he said carefully, meeting his gaze with intent. “You’re the only one who can help me.”

“Is that so?”

“Yes.”

“Because it seems to me you had no idea who you were going to find when you showed up at my door.” Roland leaned forward. “You certainly didn’t expect to find me in charge. If I had to guess, you were probably hoping I’d moved on years ago.”

“That’s not true.”

“Which part?”

Eliot pulled back, his eyes still fixed on Roland’s. “What do you want, hm? Do you want me to beg?”

“Oh. No. Well… not yet.” He eyed Eliot up and down, lips upturned in amusement. “But I suppose... humor me. Tell me what you need, Eliot. After all these years...”

Pulse picking up, Eliot took the seat opposite Roland at the desk. “What do you know about mirror magic?”

Roland’s expression didn’t change, save for a minute quirk in one of his carefully groomed eyebrows. “Well, that depends. What sort of mirror magic are we talking? Manipulation of images—”

“I’m talking about opening a portal into the Mirror World.”

Roland barked out a laugh. “Okay. You’ve got my attention. Why is a Brakebills student coming to a hedge for help portaling to the Mirror World?”

“Because no one at Brakebills can help me.”

“So study up and do it yourself.”

“I can’t.”

“What do you mean you can’t, you were one of the most naturally talented magicians I’ve ever—”

“I can’t fucking do magic anymore, Roland!” Eliot hadn’t actually meant to shout. His hands had clenched into tight fists at his sides and he forced them to relax, sucking in deep lungfuls of air through his nose.

“Shit.” Roland’s expression softened. “Okay, well. I take it there’s a long story there. But that still doesn’t answer my question as to why you want to go to the Mirror World to begin with.”

Eliot didn’t see any point in talking around it. Roland would read him like a cheap dime store novel if he even tried. “Someone… that I care about.” He had to pause to choke back a well of emotion. “Someone that I care about died… in there.”

“So... your boyfriend.”

Eliot’s voice went very quiet. “It was more complicated than that.”

Roland was silent for a moment. Eliot could see the wheels turning behind his eyes. “I empathize, Eliot,” he finally said. “I do. It’s hard losing someone that you care about.” His words were loaded, aiming right for Eliot’s softest parts. “But I can’t do it.”

“Why not?” Eliot hated the way that his voice cracked.

“Because I don’t know how.” He gave Eliot an incredulous look “And I don’t know anyone who can. At least not anyone who’s still around.”

“Roland. Please, I’m—”

“Okay. I might…” He stood and went to his filing cabinet in the corner. “I might have… something. Not… what you’re asking for, but…”

Eliot worried his hands in his lap, watching Roland flip through loose pages and thick binders and tattered spiral notebooks. 

“So there was this magician from Venice, right? Francesco. Oh, Eliot, you should have seen him,” Roland smiled brightly as he continued his search. “He was the most beautiful thing, ass like a dream. We fucked on the roof of my apartment under the stars and—” He broke off to laugh, pulling something out of one of his binders. “I suppose that’s not important. Anyway, he showed me a spell.”

Eliot was practically bouncing out of his seat. “I’m listening.”

“It’s not a portal exactly.” Roland took his seat, passing Eliot a single loose page across the desk. “You can’t go in, but it allows you to see into the place at least. I did it once but it was so boring I never bothered doing it again.”

Eliot looked down at the page clutched in his hands, a sketch of a full-length mirror and a few crude hand positions next to an incantation in Italian. “So you have a spell that lets you see into a mirror. Groundbreaking, Roland, truly.”

Eliot tossed the page and watched as it floated down and settled right in front of Roland, who studied it lazily. “Maybe boring was the wrong word,” he said. “You can manipulate it a little, navigate through the space around you… almost like a video game.” His voice had gone all soft, a familiar sound that tugged at something deep in Eliot’s bones. “Only there’s nothing and no one there. Everything is dark and quiet. Kind of spooky, actually.”

“But if someone were there.” Eliot’s voice sounded so pitiful, so exhausted, he hardly recognized it at all.

The corner of Roland’s mouth turned up in a smile. “You said he died.”

Eliot’s breath was coming quickly now, remembering the sight of his face, the flash of his eyes, the curve of his mouth. “I saw him.”

Roland’s brows knitted themselves together. “How do you mean?”

“I saw him. In a mirror. Just a flash. Twice now. It was… I know it was him.” Eliot swallowed, feeling suddenly foolish. “I think.”

“You think?” Roland cocked his head to one side. “Or you know?”

Softly, Eliot said, “I know.”

Roland tapped a finger against his chin, studying Eliot’s face. “You know, Francesco did tell me one other thing. I didn’t put much stock in it at the time, didn’t have any reason to. We couldn’t get into the place so it hardly mattered.”

Eliot took a shaky breath and let it out. “Tell me.”

“Well, rumor has it you don’t really die if something happens to you in there. It’s an in-between space, you know. I don’t remember the words he used exactly…” Roland stared down at the page, concentrating hard, his face lighting up when he finally looked back to Eliot. “Refract. That’s it. You don’t die, you just refract. Whatever that’s supposed to mean. Anyway, we were pretty high at the time, so—”

Eliot’s blood pounded loudly in his ears, drowning out the sound of his own voice. “You have to help me,” he blurted. “Roland. Please. We—You. You have to do this spell for me.”

Roland pressed the page down on the desk, shooting Eliot a mischievous look. “Do I now?”

Eliot fought the urge to scream, hope blooming hotly under his ribs. “I told you… I can’t do magic. I need someone. To do this spell.”

“Plenty of adepts at Brakebills who could do it. I’ll copy the page for you,” Roland’s smile grew wide, “for a price.”

“I can’t ask… anyone that I know.”

“Why?”

Eliot trembled with the force of his longing. “For the same reason that I had to come here to begin with. It’s complicated. And not something that I think you particularly give a shit about, so just tell me how much I have to pay for your time and… I’ll find a way.”

“Oh, Eliot,” Roland said, his voice dripping with concern edged in mockery. “The man in the mirror has you all twisted around, doesn’t he? Look at you. You’re a wreck.”

Eliot took a shuddering breath, his foot bouncing wildly against the floor. “Just name your price. Do you wanna go to Fillory? I know the High King, I can get you—”

Roland cut him off with a laugh. “Oh, you have been on quite the adventure, haven’t you? Fillory. Wow.” He leaned back and looked Eliot over. “Eliot, sweet baby. How quickly you forget. I haven’t any interest in fairytales.”

“It’s not a fairytale,” Eliot spit. “Fillory is a land made of pure fucking magic. Much more magic than that little filing cabinet of yours could ever hope to contain.”

“Whatever.” Roland gestured airily with his hands. “I don’t want a trip to magicland. And you know I certainly don’t need your money.”

Eliot clenched his jaw. “Then what do you want?”

Roland’s eyes grew dark, pulling a thousand memories from the well of Eliot’s mind. “You, of course.”

Eliot could feel his heart flopping around on the cold foundation under his feet. “Sorry,” he said looking down at his own hands. “I’m not for sale.”

“And I’m not asking to buy you.”

Eliot should have known that coming back was a mistake. _Leave and run to Alice,_ his head screamed. _Tell her what you’ve learned._ The realization that she already knew cemented him to his chair. Certainly Alice’s knowledge far exceeded that of someone like Roland, even with all his pilfered knowledge and wit. If Quentin could still be alive somewhere, Alice Quinn would know.

And then Eliot allowed himself to think the thought that had been bubbling just under the surface since their fight on the mountain: Maybe Alice wanted it this way. Maybe she wanted Quentin to stay dead. Eternally the widow, he’d be hers forever.

The thought made Eliot choke back a sob. It couldn’t be. Alice was many things, but cruel for cruelty’s sake wasn’t one of them. He’d go to her, when the time came. But first he had to be sure. He had to bring her something she couldn’t dismiss or explain away. Undeniable proof that he wasn’t going mad with grief, that’s what Eliot needed.

“No,” He said finally. “No. Pick something else.”

“Eliot. Baby. This isn’t a negotiation.” Roland shrugged. “I named my price. You. For one night in my bed. Just like old times.”

“And I said no.” He couldn’t hope to keep the poison from his voice, could hardly stand to look at the man across from him any longer. Not when each passing second made it more apparent that yeah, Eliot had always had a type. He could almost be him. In the dark, reaching out his hand. Maybe he could pretend—

Eliot could feel Roland boring holes into the back of his mind when cheerily he said, “Well, I guess that will be all then, hm? You can let yourself out the back exit. Certainly you still remember the way.”

Eliot considered begging, or maybe just giving in. Jesus, would it really be so bad? He and Roland had always had a good time in bed together, and it’s not like Eliot had ever been precious about casual sex. But the idea of being with him now, with anyone who wasn’t—

Eliot let his chair scrape loudly against the floor. Rising to his feet, he didn’t look to Roland as he turned away. He reached for the door, his heart shredding itself into a million tiny pieces behind him as he pulled it open. He’d go to Alice, try to make her see—

“Wait,” Roland said when Eliot was already halfway out the door. “Just… wait.”

Eliot shivered, turning back around. “What?”

A strain of tense laughter worked its way out of Roland’s throat. “I was only fucking with you, Eliot. Come now, don’t look so dejected. Of course I’ll help you with this silly little spell. My apartment is close. We could go right now.”

“No.” Eliot shoved his hands deep into his jacket pockets, hope returning to him in waves. “No, you come to my place. Tonight. I’ll write the address down.”

Always the master of masking his true feelings, Roland eyed him blankly. “You drive a hard bargain, Eliot. But... I suppose I haven’t anything better to do tonight.”

Roland rummaged through a desk drawer, pulling out a pen and a slip of paper, passing them to Eliot and watching as he scribbled down the penthouse’s address, raising his brows when Eliot passed it back. “Really? I would ask how you managed to swing that, but I don’t imagine I’d get much of an answer.”

Eliot moved his body closer to the door. “I’ll see you tonight,” he said, looking away, hopeful and anxious and ashamed.

“I wouldn’t miss it for the world,” Roland purred, and Eliot slipped out of the office, pulling the door shut behind.

Eliot made his own way out through the loading dock, brushing off the hedge who’d escorted him in. He could have navigated this place blind or in the dark. The sky was misting gently when he stepped outside, and he walked without direction, willing himself to calm the tiny spark of hope growing larger in his belly by the second.

He took a cab back to the penthouse and stood outside the door selfishly hoping he might find it empty on the other side. When finally he went in, four faces all turned at once to greet him. Julia, Margo, Alice, Twenty-Three. The energy that buzzed in the air told him they had definitely all just been talking about him.

“There you are,” said Margo, jumping up from the sofa and all but running over. “You can’t keep disappearing like that on me.”

Eliot wanted to be soft for her, could feel himself breaking against the warmth of her touch, but he was so fucking tired he worried if he let himself go there, even for a second, he might just collapse into her arms and never move again.

“I was just out walking. Needed to clear my head.” He was already moving himself in the direction of his bedroom door.

She let him slip away. “If I ask nicely will you leave your door unlocked so I can come check on you later?”

Eliot didn’t respond, didn’t want to glance back at the prying eyes plastered to the back of his skull. He slipped into his room. He didn’t lock the door.

He shrugged out of his jacket with a bone-deep sigh. He was in terrible need of a nap, but he needed a shower more. Or a bath. A bath sounded fucking divine. Luckily for Eliot, he’d taken over the master suite during his period of healing, and with Kady gone now on official Library business, he’d never been asked to give it back.

He clicked on the light in the en suite bathroom and stripped off every stitch of his dirty, stinking clothes. He shut his eyes and stood there for a moment, allowing himself to feel weightless. He ran the tips of his fingers along the mangled edges of the scar from the axe that had freed him from the bonds of the Monster. Sometimes he thought he could still feel the dark energy thrumming there.

He nearly fell asleep waiting for the tub to fill, but slipping beneath the surface of the water he didn’t think he’d ever known such perfect relief. He moaned audibly, every last muscle in his body surrendering to the call of relaxation. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d allowed himself to give in, to melt into the calm, if only for a moment.

The seed had been planted now, and Eliot was helpless against the roots threatening his heart. He allowed himself to think his name, once— _Quentin_ —trapping it under his tongue and stowing it away. Hope was a dangerous thing, he knew. Hope was a thing with teeth and claws. Hope was a cliff’s edge that beckoned, the cold air and the hard ground waiting under. A sharp blade against the soft flesh of your belly.

Eliot choked down his hope, felt it fester in his bones. He stayed in the tub until the water went cold, toweled himself off and padded out into the bedroom. He shut off all the lights, the blinds shut tight to block out the day outside. He slipped into bed, drew the covers up to his ears, and was out the moment his head hit the pillow.

And for the first time in weeks, Eliot slept peacefully, dreaming of nothing at all.

—

Eliot woke to dusk and stretched out languidly on the bed. He clicked on the bedside lamp and was greeted by a loose sheet of paper suspended on the air at his side. He recognized Margo’s elegant hand right away.

_El,_

_Didn’t wanna wake you. Blipping somewhere sunny with Twenty-Three and Julia for a while. Thought you might appreciate the space. Alice didn’t wanna come. Sorry._

_I love you even if you’re a total dick bag._

_M_

Eliot plucked the page out of its enchantment with a smile, folding it neatly before placing it on the nightstand. He pulled his long limbs out of bed, went to the bathroom and washed his hair in the sink, took his time drying and styling it. He dressed in clean clothes and even dabbed on a little cologne. For the first time in as long as he could remember, Eliot almost felt like a person.

He looked himself over for a long time in the full length mirror on the back of the closet door. This is where they would do the spell, Eliot decided. Better to be out of sight of prying eyes before the time had come. When he turned away from his reflection, his heart was dashing itself madly against his ribs, and he had to steady himself with a few deep breaths before leaving the room.

He found Alice curled up in front of the fireplace with a book in her lap. “We got takeout,” she said as he passed by. “From that Thai place you like. There’s plenty left if you’re hungry.”

He shot her a tiny smile that she didn’t see. “Thanks.” 

Eliot ate cold pad thai straight from the container, standing in the cold air and sallow light of the fridge, washing it down with a glass of rosé. The knock came when he was washing his glass in the sink, and Eliot nearly shattered it in his mad dash to beat Alice to the door.

“I’ll get it!” He shouted, and Alice eyed him as he zoomed by.

“Expecting someone?”

Eliot didn’t answer. His stomach twisted itself into a mess of knots as he pulled the door open to find Roland smirking on the other side, spotless in his dark gray suit and clutching a bottle of wine.

Eliot rolled his eyes. “You do know this isn’t a dinner party,” he said, ushering him inside. 

Roland stepped inside like he owned the place, eyes scanning over every inch of the penthouse. “Why on Earth would I think this was a dinner party?”

“It’s also not a date.”

“Oh, don’t be silly. Of course it’s not a date.” Roland’s eyes fell to Alice as she made her way over to them. “And who’s this? I didn’t know we would be three tonight.”

Eliot clenched his jaw. “We won’t be.”

“Hi.” Alice extended a hand that Roland took delicately into his own. “I’m Alice.”

“Roland. It is lovely to meet you, Alice.” He kissed the back of her hand, and Alice shot Eliot a curious look.

“I thought I’d met all of Eliot’s friends,” she said, pulling her hand away, looking him up and down. Eliot knew exactly what she was thinking.

“Oh, I’m sure you have,” he purred. “Eliot and I hadn’t seen one another for many years until he showed up on my doorstep looking absolutely dreadful this morning.” He turned to Eliot, gesturing wildly. “Isn’t that right, Eliot?”

Eliot snatched the bottle from Roland’s hand and passed it to Alice, pleading with his eyes. “Would you...” he started, but she was already turning away. “Thank you,” he mumbled to her back.

Roland smiled after her, looking quite pleased with himself. “Should I ask why you didn’t just ask her to do the spell for you? Oh baby, I can feel the magic pouring off of that one.”

Eliot drew in a breath and turned on his heels, starting for the bedroom door. “Just… let’s get this over with.”

Roland quirked his brow when Eliot locked the door behind them. “Should have brought the wine. I know how much your like your Bordeaux. You got your palate from me, you know. Oh, you were such an amateur before I—”

“Why don’t we just get on with the spell,” Eliot cut in, worrying his hands together, glancing over at the mirror.

Roland loosened his tie at the throat, shrugging off his jacket, draping it over the armchair in the corner. “You always were so impatient. Maybe that’s why you never called after…” Methodically, he began rolling up his sleeves. “Too busy getting on, I suppose. Looking back is such a waste, don’t you think?”

Eliot chewed on a pang of guilt and swallowed it down. “Is there anything you need me to do before we start?”

“No,” Roland said, sounding wistful. “You’re perfectly all right. I take it you’d like us to do it in the full length mirror?”

“Where else?”

Roland smirked, loosening his tie a little more and approaching the mirror. “Come. Join me,” he said, kneeling down before it.

Eliot was bouncing out of his skin. His legs wanted to move, to run, and kneeling next to Roland took all the patience he could muster. His lungs ached to scream. _Show him to me. Show him to me now._

“So how does this work?” Eliot forced himself to focus. “Did you bring the page?”

“Don’t be silly, darling. You know how excellent my memory is.” Roland tapped a finger against his temple. “Simple mirror magic. A revelation spell with a little extra kick.”

Eliot narrowed his eyes. “Suddenly you’re an expert on mirror magic?”

“Oh, my dear boy, I’ve learned many things in our years apart.” He leaned into Eliot’s personal space. “Maybe later on I can teach you another thing or two.”

Eliot’s whole body clenched. In the dim light, Roland’s hair moved around his face, and he had to force his eyes away. “Would you please just do it?”

Roland stretched his arms above his head, cracking his knuckles when he was finished. “Care to tell me who this man in the mirror is before we begin?”

Deep in his marrow, Eliot ached. “No.”

“Oh,” Roland purred. “That special, hm? Fair enough.”

Eliot gripped his knees, rocking back and forth, every cell in his body alive with wanting. Roland formed a triangle with his fingers and peered through it, whispering an incantation that sent blue veins of magic crackling over the mirror. He performed a series of tuts, created a circle with his thumb and forefinger. A slat of light fell from the circle and onto the mirror, and as he spoke in careful Italian the light washed itself over the mirror before falling away.

Roland dropped his hands. “That should do it.”

Eliot shivered, leaning forward and gazing into the mirror. “It doesn’t look any different.”

“Are you sure about that? Look closer. Here. Let me bring down the lights.” Roland held up his hand, manipulating the switch on the wall, dragging it down to just a flicker. 

Eliot pressed his hands to the floor. The room was eerily quiet, and it was only just then that he realized he could no longer see his own reflection. The room was dark, but the image in the mirror was coming through like a grayscale picture on an old TV screen, crackling with static.

“That’s it,” Eliot said, breathless, looking over to Roland in the dim light.

“That’s it.” Roland held up the fingers on his right hand, like a benediction. “Shall we have a look around?”

“Is there… a way to…” Eliot could hardly speak over the pounding of his heart.

Roland crooked his fingers, and the image began to move. “You want to know if we can summon him?”

“Something like that.”

“I’m not sure. I wouldn’t think so. Revelation spells aren’t meant to work that way. But if he’s truly trying to break through to you, I imagine he’s going to let us know.”

Eliot kept his eyes locked on the fluttering image, barely blinking, barely breathing. Roland shifted their view out of the bedroom, going straight through the wall at their side. The living room, the reading nook, the dining room, the kitchen. Every inch of the penthouse’s first floor was empty and quiet. 

Roland moved the image up the spiral staircase and down the hall of the second floor. It was like watching some terrible horror movie, Eliot thought, holding his breath and waiting for something—someone—to jump out of the shadows. They moved through bedrooms, bathrooms, the study with its walls lined floor-to-ceiling with hundreds of Marina’s stolen books. They watched the world in its frozen, barren mirror image through windows, Eighth Avenue below utterly devoid of all life, littered with the metal ghosts of cars. Once, Roland froze their journey in front of another full length mirror, and Eliot’s head began to pound. The image it reflected back looked like falling snow.

“There’s not a soul in here, Eliot,” Roland said, moving back down the length of the hall and heading for the stairs. 

Eliot sat back on his heels, clenching his hands into fists. “Keep looking,” he said, taking a shaky breath. “Can you go outside. How far does this go?”

The image sizzled and popped like burning celluloid. “Well, I imagine it might go on forever. It’s a perfect, dead image of our world after all. This spell, sadly, has quite a limited range. I doubt I’d be able to see much further than your apartment.”

Eliot watched unblinking until the image came back into view. “You can try.”

“Eliot. Baby.” The pity in his voice made Eliot want to scream until his lungs gave out. “Have you seen anything alive in there at all?”

“You haven’t—” Eliot swallowed down the growing pit in his belly. Reaching over, he snatched Roland’s hand and held it firmly in place. “You haven’t looked everywhere yet.”

Roland was so relaxed it was maddening, allowing Eliot to steer the movement of his hand without resistance, going back over all the dark and empty spaces of the penthouse where they’d already been. 

“If he were reaching out, he’d be here already,” Roland reasoned, his voice soft and low. “Don’t you think?”

“No.”

Eliot jerked his hand around and headed for the front door, but when he tried to pass through it the image in the mirror fizzled out entirely and then faded to black. And in a blink Eliot was staring at the shadowy reflections of himself and Roland there in the dark room.

Roland pulled his hand from Eliot’s slackening grip. “Eliot—”

“No.” Eliot’s stomach lurched. He was going to be sick.. Roland placed a hand on his shoulder and Eliot wrenched away, jerking himself unsteadily to his feet. “You have to do it again.”

“Oh. Dear sweet boy.” Roland stood, blocking Eliot’s view of the mirror, reaching for him in the dim light. “Do you want to tell me about him?”

Eliot stepped back, choking back the tears welling in his eyes. “I just—I want you to—” He forced himself to breathe, the room tipping and spinning under his feet. “Just do the spell again.”

“Did you see him die, Eliot?”

A sob caught in Eliot’s throat. “If you’re not going to help me...”

Roland raised the lights a little, just enough to bring out the features of his face. “You know, I never really stopped thinking about you. At first, I was confused. Then so… angry. That my darling Eliot would abandon the life we’d built together.”

Eliot actually laughed, his throat quivering with the promise of tears. “You cannot be serious right now.”

Roland moved his body nearer, reaching up and brushing a strand of hair from Eliot’s brow. “Why don’t you come home with me, hm? It’s dreadful to see you in such a state.”

If Eliot averted his gaze, the image in his periphery was achingly familiar. The gulf opening in his belly grew wider by the second, a swirling dark that threatened to consume him, body and soul. What Eliot needed, more than anything, was something to fill it up. 

_If I keep my eyes closed,_ he thought, _maybe it could feel the same._

Roland stepped into his personal space and Eliot let him. “You just need someone to take care of you, darling, isn’t that right?”

Any stitch of hope that Eliot had been clinging to unfurled and died away. Perhaps there had never been any hope at all. The answer was simple: Eliot was losing his mind with grief, and Roland hadn’t shown up at his door because of a spell. Perhaps he’d known all along they’d find nothing on the other side of the mirror but the cold and dark.

Eliot shut his eyes, repeating Quentin’s name on a loop in his mind like a torturous prayer. Roland took Eliot’s face in his hands, coming up on his toes and pressing their lips together. He allowed himself to be kissed, but made no effort to return the affection, bunching his hands in fists at his sides, conjuring to life Quentin’s face.

He just wanted to feel something other than the cold embrace of dark. Roland broke away, and Eliot opened his eyes.

“Come home with me,” Roland said softly.

“No,” Eliot said, swallowing down his emptiness. “Take off your clothes.”

Roland’s hand went to the loose knot of his tie with a smirk. “And here I thought you’d never ask.”

Eliot turned his back, began working open the cuffs of his shirt. He could hear Roland undressing behind him, the rustling of fabric as it hit the floor, the metallic clink of his belt being worked open. Eliot unbuttoned his shirt and shrugged it off. Turning back around, Roland had stripped himself bare in record time.

Eliot reached for the dimmer switch, turning the lights down until he could just make out the lines of Roland’s body as he approached. “Why don’t you let me help you with those, darling?” he said, slipping his fingers into the waistband of Eliot’s pants.

His fingers were warm, but Eliot’s body could feel nothing but cold. Roland leaned up to kiss him again but Eliot turned away. He didn’t miss a beat, ducking his head and settling for Eliot’s throat, sucking a line down to his collarbone and making happy little sounds.

Roland nosed up the side of Eliot’s neck. “Do you want me to fuck you, baby?”

“No,” Eliot said, clenching his jaw, putting his hands on Roland’s bare shoulders and pushing him back. “Get on your knees.”

Roland hummed, trailing a finger down Eliot’s chest. “Happily. If memory serves you’re carrying quite the beast down there.” Roland sank down slowly, reaching up to work open Eliot’s belt. “Will you put it in my ass after you’ve finished with my mouth?”

Eliot didn’t answer.

Roland tugged his pants and underwear down below his knees, wrapping a warm hand around Eliot’s soft cock. “My, my. Not even a little excited for me, baby? Though I must say, even like this... it’s more impressive than I remember.”

Eliot groaned, tangling his fingers in Roland’s hair. “Just stop talking and get me hard.”

Eliot willed the illusion to take hold. In this light it was almost convincing, the length and color of his hair a near perfect match, his face obscured in shadow. Roland nuzzled at his soft cock, mouthing along the shaft, taking the head delicately into his mouth and lavishing it with his tongue. Eliot ached for arousal to come, but after more than five minutes of Roland’s careful attention, he was still just as soft as when they began.

“Come on, baby,” Roland drawled. “Come on, let me get you out of that messy head of yours. What do you want? Do you want me to eat your ass? Seem to recall that always got you purring like a kitten.”

“No,” Eliot huffed, tugging at Roland’s hair. “Just put it back in your mouth.”

Eliot didn’t need to get out of his own head. Not anymore. What he needed now was only to remember. With his eyes screwed shut, Eliot let himself drift away, falling headlong into the warm embrace of memory.

He felt it like a jolt to his heart, sun-warmed tiles under his bare feet, Quentin’s mouth laughing against his neck. Immediately his arousal began stirring between his legs.

“We’re never gonna finish this thing if we keep taking mid-afternoon blowjob breaks, El.”

“Hey, if you don’t want to blow me…”

Quentin slid his hands up the back of Eliot’s shirt. “Hey now, I never said that.”

“I’m pretty sure I can work out a system to place tiles and blow you at the same time, so.”

Quentin’s whole body shook when he laughed. He pressed a kiss to Eliot’s throat and hummed. “That sounds like an excellent system. You’ll have to teach me when you get it all figured out.”

Eliot tangled his fingers in Quentin’s hair and kissed the top of his head. “It would be my pleasure.”

Quentin let his mouth drift lower, sucking a kiss to Eliot’s skin just inside the open collar of his shirt. They’d been here for a year and six weeks exactly, and Eliot couldn’t believe how soft he’d become for Quentin since the night of their one year anniversary. The night when everything suddenly shifted. But in a way, Eliot knew, he’d always been soft for Quentin.

Quentin’s clumsy fingers began working open the buttons of Eliot’s shirt. “What did we even do for a whole year before this?”

Eliot smiled, watching Quentin pop the last button open and fall down to his knees. “We drank way too much. You know, if nothing else this whole thing has really taken some of the pressure off our livers.”

“Is that what this is?” Quentin eyed him softly, working open the buckle of his belt. “A... thing.”

Eliot thumbed at his cheek. “You know what I mean,” he said, aching at the look in Quentin’s eyes.

“Do I know?”

Eliot laughed. “What do you want me to say, Q?”

“I don’t know, I—it’s just, this is…” Quentin let out a little laugh. “This is good. I think.”

“Yeah. I think it’s good too.”

“I’m sorry.” Quentin tucked an errant strand of hair behind his ear, flushing a deep shade of pink. “I’m gonna shut up and suck your dick now.”

Eliot’s body shook with silent laughter. “Okay. I was wondering what you were doing down there.”

Eliot could feel the memory slipping away. He tried to hold on for just a little longer. Quentin tugging at his pants, laughing as he got them down mid-thigh before deciding that was enough. Quentin nuzzling against Eliot’s hip, smiling. He couldn’t recall ever seeing him smile as much as he did in these moments.

Eliot threaded his fingers into Quentin’s hair. “Hey,” he breathed.

Quentin wrapped his hand around Eliot’s cock, looking up at him with wide eyes. “Hey.”

Whatever Eliot was going to say lost itself to the rush of the moment. Quentin took him into his mouth, making him gasp. “Q. Fuck,” he muttered, then laughed. “Yes, Q. Fuck. Yes.”

Eliot whined when Quentin took his mouth away. “What’s that, sweet boy? Nice and hard for me now, hm? That’s what I like to see.” Roland’s voice cut in through the fog.

Fuck. Eliot pulled away, his heart ticking wildly in his chest. “Why don’t you just go get on the bed?”

Roland rose to his feet, wrapping his hand loosely around Eliot’s length as he leaned up to press a kiss to his jaw. “Gonna give me that big dick in my ass now, lover?”

Eliot pressed a hand to his shoulder and shoved him back. “Don’t call me that.”

Roland shrugged and spun on his heels, sauntering over to the bed. “I would ask if you want to do that nifty little spell on me, but since you have no magic…”

Eliot bit back a surge of anger, focused on getting the condoms and lube from the nightstand. “Don’t need magic to get my dick in your ass. Get on your hands and knees.”

Roland made an approving sound, flipping onto his belly. “Such a demanding boy. That shy little thing you were when we first met is long gone, hm?”

Eliot gave his cock a few lazy strokes, desperately trying just to keep it up for now. He climbed onto the bed with a condom and the bottle of lube and took Roland by the hips, hoisting him up onto his knees.

Roland pressed his face down to the mattress and hummed. “I have missed this.”

Eliot focused on the image before him: the smooth dip of his back, the way his hair fell down over his face, obscuring it entirely. He dragged one hand down the flesh of his ass and then the other, eliciting from Roland an impatient sound.

“Don’t be so gentle darling, you know I like it rough.”

Eliot sighed and reached for the lube, popping it open and letting a stream drizzle down between Roland’s cheeks. He tossed the bottle aside and spread Roland apart, dragging the pad of one finger over the puckered flesh of his hole.

He caught a glimpse of himself reflected in the full length mirror across the room. In the dim light, he could only just make out the shape of his own body, the shape of the body pressed into the mattress beneath him. His face flushed hotly and he looked away, shutting his eyes and pressing his finger into Roland’s body.

Roland gasped, then laughed, and Eliot willed his mind to drift away. Remember, remember. How long had it been? Fifteen years or more.

“Hurry up,” Quentin laughed. “Before Teddy gets back.”

“Please,” Eliot said. “He’ll be out there exploring for hours. You know how he gets.”

“Still.” Quentin whined, rubbing his ass back against Eliot’s erection. “I need it so bad, El.”

Eliot sucked a kiss into the side of Quentin’s neck and was rewarded with a gasp. “A whole three days without my dick inside of you. How did you ever survive?”

“I don’t know. Do the spell. I don’t wanna wait.” Quentin’s body trembled with laughter. “Do I have to beg?”

Eliot hummed, snaking an arm around Quentin’s chest and pulling him close. “Don’t hate the sound of that.”

Roland let out a moan that wrenched Eliot back to reality. He opened his eyes, pushed in a second finger, stroking his cock with his free hand just to keep himself erect. 

Roland rocked his hips, fucking himself back onto the length of Eliot’s fingers. “I want it,” he whined. “Please, Eliot, fill me up with that big dick. I’m ready. You have no idea how much I’ve missed it.”

Eliot stilled Roland’s hips and pulled his fingers free. He reached for the condom and tore it open with his teeth, sheathing himself quickly and slicking himself with lube. He gripped Roland’s hips with his sticky fingers and tugged him back, lining himself up at once.

“Oh fuck,” Roland spit out, scrabbling at the duvet, wiggling his ass back against the head of Eliot’s cock. “Go on, baby. Shove it in there. You know I can take it.”

“I know,” Eliot said through gritted teeth, pressing forward, feeling Roland’s body opening to him with little resistance. “I don’t need you to remind me.”

“So testy. You learned from the best, didn’t you?” Roland pushed back with a moan. “Oh baby, you’re the biggest I’ve ever had, you know that? The best, too. Yes. Oh. Just like that.”

“Just…” Eliot stilled his hips for a moment. “If you would just stop talking… this would go a lot faster, you know.”

Roland let out a sound that Eliot thought might be a laugh. He screwed his eyes shut and started to move, desperate for the warm relief of memory once again.

“Open up for me, sweetheart,” he purred against Quentin’s ear.

“Please, El. Please just do the spell,” Quentin whined, rocking back on Eliot’s slick fingers. “I want you… want you inside of me.”

“Oh, but I am inside of you.” Eliot crooked his fingers and hummed happily at the sound it pulled from Quentin’s throat.

“El. Oh fuck.” Eliot hardly had to move his fingers now with how desperately Quentin was fucking back onto them, the greedy sounds spilling out of his mouth enough to make him dizzy.

“This is my favorite part, you know that?” Eliot nosed up the side of Quentin’s neck. “Why would I ever want to skip this?”

“El I swear I’m gonna come like this if you don’t just put your dick inside of me already.”

Eliot laughed softly. “Okay, okay. That’s it, my love. Just relax. Roll over. On your belly for me. I’m gonna take such good care of you.”

Eliot bottomed out and Roland cried, shoving the memory away. “Eliot,” he purred. “Feels so good, lover.”

Eliot growled, pulling out halfway. “I said,” he punctuated his words with a single hard thrust, “don’t call me that.”

Roland bunched up the covers in his hands and moaned. “I’ll call you whatever you want if you just start moving.”

“Just don’t say anything, okay? Just…” Eliot looked up into the mirror again. From this angle he could almost see it. The body beneath him almost worked. “Don’t. Just let me…”

Roland cried out when Eliot started to move, snapping his hips in a brutal, steady rhythm. Roland may have been speaking then, but he couldn’t be sure. It wasn’t his voice that Eliot was hearing.

“Oh my god, El. Oh my god,” Quentin cried into the crook of his arm.

Eliot soothed a hand down the dip of Quentin’s spine. “Shhh. Calm down, sweetheart.” He laughed. “Jesus, Q. You’d think it’d been three years, not three days.”

Quentin moaned. “Please. Move. Please, El.”

Eliot pressed himself all along Quentin’s back, hooking an arm around his middle, rocking his hips slowly, nosing at the nape of his neck. “There, there. God you feel so fucking good, Q. So tight and warm. Like your body was made for me.” 

Roland began fucking himself back onto Eliot’s cock, matching the rhythm of his hips. Eliot draped himself over his back, allowing himself for a moment to just feel it. With his eyes closed, the slick flesh almost felt the same. Almost. Though the current of magic that flowed under Roland’s skin felt utterly hollow. Quentin’s body had been a light in the dark. The body that writhed under him now barely registered as a flicker.

He pulled back, gripping Roland by the hair and picking up the pace, eyes screwed shut, drifting back into the comfort of remembering.

“I’m gonna come,” Quentin whined, his body opening to Eliot completely. “I’m—I’m so close, El.”

“Not yet,” Eliot sucked a kiss into the slope of Quentin’s shoulder. “Not yet, my love. Can you hold on just a little longer for me?”

“I can try.”

Eliot nosed into his sweat-slick hair. “That’s my good boy. My beautiful, perfect…”

Eliot lost himself to the quivering of Quentin’s body beneath him. Quentin babbled into the crook of his arm as their bodies rocked together in a practiced dance. The steady, aching heartbeat of their love. There was nothing in the whole of the universe quite as beautiful as the feeling of Quentin Coldwater’s body trembling on the edge of orgasm, Eliot was certain.

“Do you want me to stroke you?” Eliot asked, breathless, his fingers skimming the delicate flesh of Quentin’s abdomen. “Or do you wanna come just like this? Just from my cock moving inside you?”

“Just like this,” Quentin gasped in between his broken moans. “Just like this, just like—”

“Fuck, I’m so close,” Roland whined, and Eliot’s eyes snapped open. “I’m gonna come on your big, beautiful dick. Don’t stop.”

Eliot was right on the edge himself, could feel his orgasm winding up tight, threatening to snap. Beneath him, Roland lifted his face, and Eliot caught the dim reflection of it in the full length mirror across the room. And teetering on the precipice, the illusion took hold there in the flesh. For one perfect moment, Eliot moved inside the body of his beloved. Not a memory that he tried so desperately to hold onto, but something real and warm and alive.

An open mouth, a silent cry. Eliot snapped his hips, chasing his pleasure, his eyes wide open and fixed on the mesmerizing shape of their reflection. The way their bodies moved, the image in the mirror painted in shadow, the long hair bunched up in his desperate fingers. All of it came together at once. It almost felt like home. 

And then it was all over. Eliot’s eyes slid shut, his orgasm rushing in to swallow him whole. He shook with the force of it, letting out a single broken cry. Roland sobbed out Eliot’s name, and he knew that he was coming too just as his hips began to falter.

Roland dropped his face to the mattress, shattering the illusion, and Eliot’s body went cold. It was only in the lilting rhythm of his memory that he could find his warmth.

“Yes, El. Yes. Right there. I’m coming. Oh, fuck I’m co—” Quentin’s words were swallowed up by a sob, his whole body wracked with the force of an orgasm so magnificent, so perfect, that Eliot felt it traveling the line of Quentin’s flesh into his own.

It was a feeling like pure magic, like the Wellspring had sprung wide open, flowing from the source into their veins. Eliot shuddered through it, nipping at the join of Quentin’s neck and shoulder until he’d emptied himself completely.

They collapsed together in a sweaty, tangled heap, and didn’t move for a very long time. Quentin mumbled, “That was nice,” and Eliot couldn’t help but laugh.

“Yeah it was.” He smiled into the crook of Quentin’s neck. “I’m the best lay you’ve ever had, Coldwater.”

Quentin’s laugh echoed like music. “Yeah, yeah. Don’t let it go to your head.”

Roland’s body went slack beneath him, and Eliot pulled his softening cock from his body, the whole of him trembling with unwanted emotion. “I think it’s time... for you to go,” he said, stumbling to his feet and snapping off the condom.

Roland flipped over onto his back and spread himself out on the bed, luxuriating in the afterglow. “Oh, Eliot, darling. What are you talking about? You’ve only just pulled your dick out of me.”

“I don’t care.” He tied off the condom and went to the bathroom to toss it away, his heart racing a million miles a second when he emerged, guilt and shame and the aftershocks of pleasure all coiling in his belly.

Roland pulled himself up to sit and reached for him. “Come here, dear boy. Sit with me. Let us breathe for a minute, and then we can talk. Finally. After all these years.”

“I don’t want to talk to you.” Eliot passed him without a glance on his way to the closet, avoiding the shameful gaze of his own reflection in the mirror. He took out a pair of soft pants and pulled them on, waiting for Roland to move or speak.

“All these years, Eliot. All these years and you just—”

Eliot laughed, allowing his anger to wash over him completely. “Let me guess, Roland. You think I, what, owe you because I moved on with my life and found something better than being your little arm candy fuck toy? Give me a fucking break.”

Eliot crossed to the other side of the room, careful to keep his back to the bed. He couldn’t bear to look Roland in the eyes.

When Roland’s voice finally came it was quiet. “Is that all you think you were to me? Just something I could dress up and fuck whenever I wanted?”

“It doesn’t matter,” Eliot said over his shoulder, hating the way his voice quavered. “Just get the fuck out. I’m tired of looking at you.”

“I understand that your heart is broken over… whoever he was. Your boyfriend. I don’t know. But that doesn’t give you the right to…” He let out a bitter laugh. “To use me to try and feel better.”

“Use you? That’s cute.” Eliot turned to him slowly, keeping his eyes fixed somewhere beyond his face. “Like you didn’t come here tonight hoping I’d fuck you. You’re so transparent it makes me sick.”

“We had a life together, Eliot,” Roland said loudly, shifting in Eliot’s periphery. “We were building something, you and me. And then you just... disappeared, no trace. Couldn’t even spare me a call. I thought if you’d wanted to leave me, surely you’d at least send for your things. But then I thought, why would he leave me? We were happy. I thought we were. And then—”

“Happy?” Eliot laughed, fifty years of memories winding themselves endlessly through his mind. “No. No, Roland, that wasn’t happy.”

“You broke my heart.”

“Yeah, well, so what?” Eliot had never needed a drink so terribly in his life. His body shook with the force of it. “It was a lifetime ago. Maybe you should get over yourself and learn to move on already.”

Eliot’s words were a poison, Quentin’s face looping like a curse in his mind. The emptiness was unbearable. He called upon his anger instead, crossing the room and picking up Roland’s tie where he’d discarded it on the floor, tossing it in the general direction of the bed.

“I said. Get. The fuck. Out!” Eliot punctuated each word with another piece of clothing, the last one catching Roland square in the face.

Roland tossed the clothes away and staggered to his feet. “What the hell is wrong with you?!”

Eliot scowled and turned away, going to the stash box that he kept on the dresser and flipping it open. He plucked up a pre-rolled joint and lit with a trembling hand, inhaling deeply as he watched Roland struggle into his pants.

“You know, you were never cruel like this before,” Roland said, pulling on his shirt. “Never. Not even when we fought. Bitchy, sure. But never cruel. You didn’t have it in you.”

Another hit. Eliot held it in until it burned. 

“When we first met... I thought you had the kindest eyes I’d ever seen.” Roland’s voice quavered, his fingers fumbling with a button. “Terribly cliche, I know, but if you asked… I’d say it’s what drew me to you right away.”

“Well, it’s a good thing I didn’t ask,” Eliot said, plucking the joint from between his lips, watching as a trail of ash tumbled down onto the carpet. “I want you to go. Now.”

Eliot turned away and wished for the smoke to cleanse him. To burn away the last rotten remnants of his mind. There was a beat of silence, the air around them thick with tension, followed by a sharp inhalation from Roland at his back. The sound of a door being opened, then slammed. Footsteps receding into the deep, hollow emptiness of goodbye.

Eliot crossed the room and gazed down at the duvet, filthy with the drying remnants of Roland’s come. He pulled it from the bed and heaved it into the corner, the joint dangling from his lips as he flopped down onto the mattress. He took a long drag and then another, the deep, gnawing emptiness at his core growing wider by the second.

What he needed was something stronger. There were a plethora of pills in his stash box, and Eliot would have swallowed every one had he the will to move his body at all. He sat there smoking mechanically, until all that remained of the joint was a pathetic little nub that he discarded into the ashtray on the nightstand.

He fell down onto his back and fixed his gaze blankly on the ceiling. The rage had passed along with the anguish. Only the emptiness remained. A vacant dark that spread its tendrils through his body like a fever. He was just a hollow now, a black hole swallowing every stitch of light from the collapsing star that used to be his heart.

Eliot lay there unmoving for a long time. He was stoned but it hardly registered, unable to tell one numbness from the next. Down here in his pit, it was all the same. There was a knock at the door and Eliot didn’t flinch, aching for a handful of pills and a bottle of something so strong it burned right through the dark. 

The door creaked open slowly. “Hey,” Alice said.

“Why knock if you’re just going to come in anyway?” Eliot was actually surprised he could speak.

“We need to talk, and I really don’t think it can wait.”

“Okay. While you’re over there would you mind grabbing me one of everything from the box on the dresser?”

“I’m not going to help you kill yourself, Eliot.”

Eliot pulled himself upright with a hollow fit of laughter. “Just tell me what you want, Alice.”

Cautiously she approached, perching next to him on the bed. “That guy that just left here. Roland? He was crying. And I heard you yelling, and—”

Eliot held up a hand. “Okay. Spare me the guilt trip. You have no idea—”

“I know that he looked like Quentin.” Alice’s words cut straight to the quick. “Or he looked like him enough. He’s someone that you knew from… before.”

Eliot fixed his gaze on the carpet between his feet. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Is that why you went to him? Brought him back here so you could—” 

Eliot laughed silently, bitterly. “No offense, Alice, but what I do with my dick is none of your business.”

“Yeah, well, no offense, Eliot, but I really don’t give a shit what you do with your dick.” Her eyes burned twin holes into the side of his face. “But I do give a shit about people who seem perfectly nice leaving this place in tears because of something that you did to them.”

“Maybe they were tears of joy.”

“You’re so full of shit.” She actually sounded like she might cry.

He glared at her now, venom rising in his belly. “Why do you care who I fuck? It wasn’t actually your boyfriend this time, don’t worry.”

A moment of silence passed between them. “You were never this cruel before,” she said. “Not even when…” Her voice quavered, and Eliot had to look away. “You won’t even say his name.”

Eliot pulled a crumpled pack of cigarettes from the nightstand and pressed one between his lips, sighing deeply when he realized he’d left his lighter across the room. He was about to toss it away when Alice took pity on him, sparking it to life with a snap of her delicate fingers.

He took a long drag and let it out. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome,” she said softly. “You know I’m not still mad at you about… what happened before. The threesome. That was a lifetime ago.”

Eliot frowned around his cigarette. “You have no idea.”

“Then tell me, Eliot. Help me understand.” Her voice broke, and Eliot felt it, a sharp little pang in the dark. “Because all I can see is you falling apart, and I know that you were in love with him and it had something to do with what happened at the mosaic, but you won’t even talk to me about that and—”

“You get to grieve him,” Eliot’s voice was flat, smoke pouring from between his lips.

“What are you talking about?”

“You’re his widow. And I was just his friend.” He shrugged, took a drag. “When it happened everyone told you how sorry they were. All our friends. They all went to you. You were the one he was in love with, and now you’ll be his widow forever. And I’ll only ever be his friend. And no one will ever know that he and I spent fifty years together in a life that... didn’t happen, but that we both somehow remembered.”

She was stricken silent, reaching out and placing a hand gently on his bare shoulder. Eliot flinched at the touch.

“We had a son. Well, Quentin did. With his wife. But then she died and… it was just the three of us. Our little family. It didn’t really happen… but it did. I remember it like it did. We grew old together. That’s what happened at the mosaic, Alice. That’s what...”

“Eliot…”

Ah. There it was. The ache again, gnashing with its mangled teeth. “But do you wanna hear the saddest part?” Eliot wiped at his damp eyes. “The stupidest fucking thing I’ve ever done in my utter waste of a life?” He choked out a single broken sob. “I rejected him. When we remembered, he… asked me if I wanted to give it a shot. For real. In this life. The two of us together. And I pushed him away... because I’m a fucking coward.”

Alice pulled her hand away, and Eliot choked down the sensation that something had been lost. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I didn’t know.”

Eliot sniffled, feeling pathetic, taking a long drag on his cigarette and letting the smoke fall lazily from his mouth. “How could you? After I… did what I did. We never talked about it again. We pretended like it never happened. I shoved it so far down that I...”

He scrubbed a hand over his face, his body trembling terribly. He really fucking needed those pills, could hear them calling to him from across the room.

“I’m sorry, Eliot,” Alice said, voice small. She rested her hand on his shoulder again. “I don’t know what to say. But I do know what it feels like to love him, and to try and move on… without him.”

“That’s the difference between me and you. I’m not trying to move on. I can’t.” Eliot hated himself even as he was saying the words, but it did nothing to stop them from coming. “So maybe you don’t understand anything at all.”

“You think you loved him more than I did.” It wasn’t a question. She took her hand away.

“I think I love him so much that it has fucking killed me, Alice. Look at me.” Eliot threw his hands up, tears welling in his eyes. “I can’t do magic anymore. That died with him. The one thing that I had that made me anything. Who the fuck am I supposed to be now? I can’t even get my dick hard without thinking about him. I—”

When Eliot looked to her, she was actually crying now, her body wracked with silent sobs, fat tears running in twin streams down her face. “Please don’t,” is all he could think to say.

“I’m sorry,” she said brokenly. “Eliot, I’m so fucking sorry.”

Eliot stubbed out his cigarette and wiped at his eyes. “You don’t have to keep saying that.”

She sobbed, burying her face in her hands. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” she repeated like a mantra, and Eliot could feel his resolve to push her away crumbling by the second. 

Maybe this was what he needed, the gentle comfort of something familiar. And maybe that was what Alice needed too. He didn’t think himself capable, but maybe he could try. “Okay, okay. Hey.” He reached across the space between them, moving nearer, wrapping an arm around her shoulders. “Okay. It’s okay. I’m sorry too.”

She lifted her face, leaning in and throwing her arms around his neck. She was trembling all over, and Eliot allowed himself to crumble, wrapping her in his embrace and burying his face in her hair. It all came spilling out then, the anguish and the shame and the despair. Eliot wept like a child in his mother’s arms, like his heart was breaking. Warm tears streamed from Alice’s eyes and down his neck, and for a moment he thought that he might never let her go.

“I’ll never be cruel to you again,” he said brokenly, without thinking. “Never, Alice, I promise.”

Alice mumbled something that Eliot couldn’t hear, pulling back and wiping at her wet face. “You’re a good man, Eliot,” she said.

Eliot shivered. “I’m really not.”

“But you are. Quentin knew it.” 

“Alice.” He recoiled as though he’d been burned. “Don’t.”

“You don’t have to say his name, okay.” She reached over and took his hand. “But I’m going to.”

There were so many more things that Eliot wanted to say, but his head was fuzzy head was too exhausted to find the words. Alice must have gotten the message, and slowly they parted. She pulled herself to her feet, worrying her hands together.

“I guess I’ll just… let you get some rest.”

Eliot turned to her, forcing a little smile. “Yeah. Okay.”

“You’ll call me if you need anything?”

He nodded. “Yeah. Thank you, Alice.”

She gave him a little nod and turned away, slipping from the room with hardly a sound. Eliot fell onto his back, lifting his hand in an attempt to magic off the lights just to humor himself. With a great sigh he got to his feet, pulling down the switch on the wall and swallowing the room in dark.

He crawled into bed under the thin sheet and curled up on his side, uncertain what he was feeling, if anything at all. He wished for sleep, for dreams, for the clarity of morning. He wished for some sign from beyond that hope might still remain.

Eliot drifted away, dreaming that he’d shattered, a million tiny pieces floating in an empty void, reflecting back the dark. But deep within that void, a single pinprick of light struggled through. And in that light there was a name. And Eliot held it on his tongue, shouting into the emptiness until his shattered pieces started to mend.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So a couple things about Roland: one, I might be in love with him. And two, he didn't actually exist when this chapter was originally written. I wrote the sex scene first and it was with a nameless stranger, but then as I was filling out the rest of the chapter he just sort of... popped into existence. And I'm so happy that he did, because the sex scene ended up working so much better with him in it, given his history with Eliot. I like him a lot. Maybe one day I will give him a story of his own.
> 
> Also I need to extend a massive thank you to everyone who left such lovely comments on chapter one. If you've made it this far without noping out, I appreciate you more than words can say. Next week's chapter is another big one. See y'all then. <3


	3. Shade

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The clarity of the morning was a miracle.

Eliot woke to pre-dawn dark, shivering under his sheet. He stumbled out of bed and felt his way to the bathroom, squinting against the light when he flipped the switch on the wall.

He hopped straight into the shower, turning the water up as hot as it would go, standing under the spray until his flesh was supple and pink. Until he felt brand new.

The clarity of the morning was a miracle. He dressed in a simple shirt dotted with tiny pink flowers, and a crisp pair of slacks, fixing his hair neatly as his trembling fingers would allow. He opened the blinds in the bedroom and let the early morning light spill through until it filled every darkened corner.

He found Alice in the kitchen, eating cold cereal at the counter.

“Hey,” he said, feeling raw and open and light. “I think we need to talk.”

“Oh?” She let her spoon clink down into the bowl. “I thought we just did that last night.”

“Yeah. About that.” Eliot considered his words carefully. “I haven’t exactly been honest with you these past few days. Well, for a long time. But… I only went to Roland because I needed help with a spell, and I thought I couldn’t come to you. And I’m realizing now that it was mostly because I’m a self-centered prick. So...”

“Okay.” She let that sit for a moment. “Care to tell me what sort of spell?”

Eliot took a breath. “I wanted to get to the Mirror World. But he couldn’t do it. He could only help me see inside.”

She gave him a hard look. “Eliot.”

“I just need you to hear me out, okay? You wanted us to communicate. This is me doing that. But I need you to listen and not just shut me down.”

“Okay,” she said, straightening her back. “I’m listening.”

“I’ve been seeing him.” He breathed deeply, letting it out slowly. “Quentin. Twice now. Both times in a mirror. That can’t be a coincidence.” He paused, his heart ticking wildly in his chest. “I know what you said happened to him, but Roland told me that… you don’t die in there, you only… refract.”

Alice gazed down into her half-empty bowl of cereal, like she might find some answers at the bottom. Her expression was grave when she finally looked up. “Doing magic in the Mirror World is a death sentence, Eliot. I saw it when I was a niffin. It’s true you can refract if you’re in there for long enough, but—”

“Alice.” He held her name carefully in his mouth. “Consider for a second that you didn’t see everything as a niffin. And also consider that I haven’t actually lost my mind. I’m not lying.”

“I never said you were.”

“Then we have to go in there and see if we can find him.”

Another beat of silence. “You didn’t see what I saw,” she said, her voice breaking a little.

“I know,” he said. “I’m sorry.”

“He chose to stay in there,” her voice went high, her expression edged in anger. He could see her spilling into it more by the second. “He chose to...”

Eliot felt her words sharply. “You don’t know that.”

“No, you don’t know. You don’t know what he—”

“Alice.” Eliot stepped forward, pressing his hands to the countertop across from her, pleading with his eyes. “I know I didn’t have to see what you saw. And I’m sorry. I can’t imagine—”

That was a lie. Eliot shut his eyes. He could imagine, he had, nearly every waking second of all those weeks he’d spent laid up in bed after the Monster. And in his dreams, the nightmare of Quentin shattering into a thousand twinkling lights, his body being torn apart, his mouth parted in a silent scream, reaching through an open door that Eliot’s feet could never move beyond.

Eliot took a shuddering breath and opened his eyes. “I’m only asking that we try.”

Alice traced a finger around the rim of her cereal bowl. “What happened? With Roland’s spell.”

“Nothing.” A single ache swelled and died away in Eliot’s chest. “I didn’t see him. But that doesn’t mean he isn’t there.”

“Okay,” she said, and Eliot narrowed his eyes.

“Okay?”

“Okay.” She nodded. “But if you really saw him—”

“I did.”

“Okay, well, even then… it might not be the real him. When you refract in there it creates echoes. In order to track down the real Quentin we would need a beacon. And even then he might be in pieces, and there’s no telling how many—”

“It doesn’t matter.” Eliot straightened his back, heart feather-light. “We’ll figure it out.”

Alice offered a tight smile. “Okay. The beacon is the most important part, but I don’t know—”

“What’s the beacon?” Eliot was practically bouncing out of his socks. 

“We’d have to make one. It relies on… a bond.” She frowned. “A connection between two people. Each beacon is different, it all depends on who you’re trying to call to.”

“Okay.” Eliot’s heart fluttered like it was trying to take flight. “So make one.”

“I don’t know that I can.”

“Is Alice Quinn really going to sit in front of me and pretend there’s a spell she can’t do?”

“You don’t understand. He’s… I haven’t seen him, Eliot. If his echoes are finding you...” She looked down at her hands. “What you told me. About the mosaic. That connection… you would have to be the one to make the beacon. And if you don’t have magic…”

Eliot shook his head. “Just tell me how the spell works.”

“It binds a part of you to the object. Temporarily.”

“What part of me?”

Alice sighed. “Your soul.”

The wheels turned in Eliot’s mind, his heart hammering away. “So like my shade?”

“Not exactly.”

“But my shade is a part of my soul.” Eliot’s thoughts rushed through him furious as a river. There could be no turning back. “Shades can be removed.”

Alice’s eyes went wide. “Eliot. No.”

“Take out my shade, use it for the beacon. Put it back in once we’ve got him.”

The look on Alice’s face was nothing short of terror. “Absolutely not. Do you have any idea how dangerous that would be?”

“I’ll be fine without it for a few minutes. Can’t be much worse than those emotion bottles we used before.”

Alice shook her head. “There are so many ways it could be damaged, Eliot. There’s no telling if there would even be anything left to put back inside of you.”

“I don’t care.” What was his shade compared to what was already gone? “Alice. Please. If this is our only shot... we have to take it.”

She sat in silence for a long time, looking like she either wanted to cry or scream. “You’ll have to give me time,” she said finally, sighing. “I don’t even know if it’s possible. I’ve never done anything like this before.”

Eliot forced a smile, unwilling to let the darkness come and snatch his hope away. “If anyone can do this,” he said, “it’s Alice fucking Quinn.”

—

Alice locked herself away in the study for hours. Eliot paced around the penthouse alone, and when she hadn’t shown her face by lunch he made her a sandwich, delivering it to her on a tray that he set on the floor beside her.

Every inch of the desk before her was covered with open books and magical instruments, pages scrawled with complex mathematical equations and fragments of spells. Eliot looked them over until his eyes crossed. “How’s it going?” he asked, stepping back and trying to read her face.

“I’m not sure.” She straightened her back, looking over the page in front of her. “I can do it. That won’t be a problem.”

“Okay. So what is the problem then?”

“Eliot, this is…” Her expression was grave when she turned to him. “Even more dangerous than I first thought.”

He swallowed down a pang of something that tasted like fear. “Is there a way for you to bind the beacon to me without—”

“No. Magic like this, it—”

“Has to come directly from the source.”

“Yes.” She sighed. “I can put your shade in the object, bind it there. It’s a good workaround… on paper. But it’s going to be incredibly unstable. And I can’t just take a piece, I have to take the whole thing. If it gets damaged—”

“I’ll be a monster,” he breathed, a strange sense of relief washing over him.

She frowned. “Something like that.”

Eliot pretended to think it over. Deep in his bones, there could be no question. “How quickly can we start?”

Alice sighed, pleading gently with her eyes. “Eliot.”

“The risk is mine,” he said, meeting her gaze head-on. “I’m choosing to do this, Alice.”

“If anything goes wrong—”

“Then that’s on me.”

She stared at him for a long time without blinking, as though time itself had paused around them. Eliot held his breath, only letting it out when she finally turned away.

“We’ll have to go to Brakebills,” she said flatly, adjusting her glasses and picking up her pen.

“Okay,” he said, unable to hide the smile spreading over his face. “I’ll be downstairs. Whenever you’re ready…”

—

Eliot sat on the sofa, tapping out an anxious rhythm with his thumb against his knee. It had been nearly an hour since he’d left left Alice to finish up her work, and he was well past the point of growing restless. 

He watched the clock on the wall, another minute passing that felt like an hour. He thought of Quentin’s face and hands and the way his eyes went narrow when he smiled. He thought of Quentin’s voice, the way it changed when he was speaking from his heart. 

He thought of Quentin’s mouth, the way it held Eliot’s name like something holy.

Margo blipped in with Twenty-Three and Julia, and Eliot nearly jumped out of his skin. He went to them, pulling Margo into his arms, kissing the top of her head.

“Hey,” she said, and he pulled away from her smiling.

“Hey.”

The look on her face was enough to break his heart. “Everything all right?”

“I don’t know,” he said, beaming now. “But I think it’s going to be... I hope.”

“Okay…” She eyed him suspiciously. “Who did you bang?”

He laughed. “Long story.”

Her eyes went wide. “I’ve got time.”

“Just come sit with me.”

“It’s good to see you smile,” Julia said, already on her way upstairs.

“What she said,” Twenty-Three offered, disappearing in a blink.

“Thank you,” Eliot mumbled, taking Margo’s hand and leading her over to the sofa.

She all but climbed into his lap when they sat down, touching his face and neck like she was trying to hold him together. Or trying to find the spot where he wasn’t stitched up right, some dead giveaway that she shouldn’t believe her eyes.

Eliot took a breath. “I’m pretty sure that Quentin is alive,” he said, watching her expression shift from concern to disbelief to horror.

“What did you do?” She touched his cheek and searched his eyes. “El…”

“Nothing. Stop looking at me like that. Alice and I have a plan.”

She took one of his hands in both of hers. “Okay. Back up. How do you think that Quentin is alive? Alice saw him die.”

“Yeah, in the Mirror World where everything is ass backwards and nothing makes sense.”

“That still doesn’t answer how you know that he’s—”

“I saw him.” He let her sit with that for a moment. “Twice. In a mirror. Mirrors, whatever. I’m pretty sure he’s been calling out to me from... in there.”

“El.” Her eyes welled with sympathy. “Honey, that sounds a little thin.”

Eliot’s heart barreling forward at a million miles a second, he paid her doubt no mind. “Alice and I are going to Brakebills to do the spell.”

“Hold up.” She pulled her hands away. “What spell?”

“We’re going to make a beacon to call out to him.”

“Wait. You get a hit of magical viagra or something?”

A pang of something bitter. Eliot swallowed it down and looked away. “No. I still can’t… Alice is going to…”

He could feel her eyes fixed firmly on his face. “There’s something you’re not telling me.”

“Look, there’s not a lot of time right now,” he said, knowing that Alice might be upstairs for several hours still, “but I promise, when I get back…”

She was silent for a moment. “I was gonna say don’t do anything stupid, but I take it whatever you’re not telling me is the stupid part.”

Eliot looked to her again. “Margo—” 

The click of Alice’s shoes winding down the staircase was like music, drawing Eliot to his feet. He had to fight the urge to grab her hand and run to the door the moment he saw her face.

“I think I’m ready,” she said, clutching a notebook in one hand, her face drawn and tired. “Or as ready as I’m going to be. I can’t do anything else until we get to Brakebills.”

“You bring him back to me in one piece, Alice.” Margo said, and Eliot felt her words like a blade to his belly. “Understand?”

Alice shot her a look. “Eliot is his own person. How many pieces he comes back in is completely up to him.”

She turned away and headed for the door. Margo actually looked amused for a second, hopping to her feet and pulling him into her arms. “We’re having a real fucking conversation when you get back,” she mumbled into his chest.

“Of course,” he said. “It’s not gonna be long, okay? We’re just going to Brakebills.”

She pulled back and gazed up into his eyes. “If whatever you have planned doesn’t work—”

“It’ll work.”

“But if it doesn’t.” She gripped him firmly by the arms. “You’re not going to fall apart on me again. El, I can’t…”

“It’s going to work.” He kissed the top of her head before turning away.

_And if it doesn’t,_ he thought, heading for the door, _I won’t be able to feel it anyway._

—

They set up in an empty classroom with Henry’s approval. “You’re going to do what you’re going to do no matter what I say,” he’d said, frowning behind his desk. “Just try to not get yourselves killed in the process.”

Being back at Brakebills set something inside of Eliot off-center, like his presence there now upset the delicate balance of the universe, even if he was technically still a student. The idea of sitting in a classroom again felt like an impossible thing.

There were three full-length mirrors in three separate corners of the room. Eliot grabbed one and wheeled it out onto the floor. “Is this where…”

Alice frowned, grabbing a jar from a low shelf. “Yes.”

Eliot let himself feel the ache. “Good,” he said, grabbing another mirror and dragging it over. “And this is where we’re going to fix it.”

“Don’t get ahead of yourself, okay? We still have to—”

“Rip out my shade and build a beacon. Got it.” Eliot dragged over the third mirror, letting Alice move them around until they were aligned in the shape of a perfect equilateral triangle.

“You know, I don’t see how you can be so casual about this,” she said, dragging over a table set up with a metal contraption affixed with magnifying glasses in its center. 

Eliot’s heart beat evenly. “I’m just doing what needs to be done,” he said, feeling calmer than he had in… well, certainly since before a god-monster had taken possession of his body. He was anxious to get on with it, but composed. Aching, but unafraid.

Alice set up a prism in the center of the metal contraption, fiddling with the magnifying glasses until they were centered. She unscrewed the lid from the jar she’d taken from the shelf, dipping in her fingers and drawing identical sigils onto each of the mirrors.

“Is that… blood?”

“Traveler blood,” she said, her fingers working carefully.

“Right.”

She finished the sigils and set down the jar, performing a cleaning spell on her hands before turning to Eliot. “I guess we should…”

Eliot’s pulse picked up a little. “Of course.”

She pulled something out of her pocket and held it in her open palm. It was the silver compact mirror they’d used on the mountain. “I thought we could use this. For the beacon.”

Eliot swallowed. “Okay.”

“There’s still time to change your mind if you don’t want to—”

“I want to.”

Alice looked as though she might be sick. “Okay.”

She opened the compact. Eliot caught a glimpse of his own reflection in the tiny circle of the mirror and his stomach lurched. Okay, maybe he was a tiny bit afraid. He had, after all, always been a tremendous coward.

“Is it going to hurt?” he asked, his breath coming quickly now.

“I’m not sure. I’ve never taken out anyone’s shade before.”

“Okay,” he said, his voice coming out a pathetic little squeak.

He shut his eyes and let his mind drift to somewhere happy, somewhere far beyond the buzzing, too-warm classroom he stood in packed with mirrors and blood and bad ideas. The only somewhere he could think to go to set his mind at ease.

Quentin, his fingers stained with chalk, wiping a hand across his brow, streaking his skin pink and blue and green. Eliot laughed, and Quentin sighed.

“What’s so funny?”

“Nothing. You’re beautiful.”

Quentin’s eyes darted between his notebook and Eliot’s face, his mouth barely suppressing a smile. “Don’t distract me. I’m almost finished writing this down.”

Eliot moved behind him, slipping an arm around his middle and pulling him close. “When you’re done...” he mumbled against Quentin’s ear.

A shudder ran through Quentin’s body. “I’m serious, El,” he laughed. “Come on. Five more minutes.”

Eliot hummed, their bodies swaying in a gentle dance, and nosed up the side of Quentin’s neck. “Five minutes…” His fingers skimmed along the hem of Quentin’s shirt, just barely grazing the skin of his belly. “I think I can do five minutes.”

Quentin leaned back into the embrace. “Five… minutes…”

The notebook fell from Quentin’s hand, and Eliot let a silent laugh roll through him, pushing his hand fully up the front of Quentin’s shirt. “Tell me what you want, sweetheart,” he purred.

“I want…” Quentin’s body went slack in Eliot’s arms. “To finish…”

“So finish...” Eliot sucked a kiss behind Quentin’s ear, reveling in the way his body responded, like a flower opening to the sun.

Quentin turned in his embrace, hooking his arms around Eliot’s neck, pulling him down to steal his lips in a hungry kiss. Eliot moaned into his mouth, his hands drifting up the back of Quentin’s shirt—

“Eliot. Eliot…” Alice’s voice drifted in, ripping him from his memory. “Did you hear me? I said I’m ready... if you’re ready.”

Eliot blinked, his pulse thumping wildly. “Just… do it. I want to get it over with. Please.”

“Okay. I need you to hold this while I…”

Eliot took the open compact from her trembling hands, cradling it gently before him. He let his eyes fall shut, grasping at memories, feeling them flutter like pests in his periphery, just out of his grasp.

Alice began reciting the incantation, and Eliot couldn’t make out the language she was speaking over the symphony of blood in his ears. There was a tugging at the center of his sternum, as though he were being unstitched by some invisible hand, gently and without pain. It was warm, and then cold, fear rising in Eliot’s throat until he gagged.

And then as quickly as it had started it was over. Eliot could hardly remember what fear should feel like anymore. He opened his eyes and looked down at the compact in his hands, the mirrors strobing like twin headlights in the dark.

He looked to Alice. There were tears in her eyes. “How do you feel?”

He eyed her, curiously. “I don’t think... that I do,” he said with a little laugh.

Eliot was empty, though not like any emptiness he’d known before. Not the gnawing, aching dark that had consumed him from the moment he’d learned that Quentin was dead. Eliot’s emptiness was glorious in its light. It was as though every bad thing he’d ever known had been wiped away. As though it had never existed at all.

“Okay…” She took the glowing compact from Eliot’s hands, fear consuming her eyes. “We should… get started.”

She carried the beacon over to the table and slipped it under the metal contraption, aligning it with the prism at its center. Eliot stood at a distance, curiously observing as her hands began to move, light spilling in clean lines from the prism, landing in brilliant flashes against the surfaces of the mirrors.

Eliot hadn’t realized how bad he’d been until suddenly the agony was gone. What a waste of all those weeks. What a waste of his life. All that pain, how useless. He watched as light pierced into the mirrors like daggers and smiled, the prism glowing red-hot and rattling its metal cage.

“It’s overloading!” Alice shouted, panic on her face and in her eyes. “Shit!”

“Maybe you should slow down,” he said, heart ticking slowly.

“I can’t stop it! We have to—”

She reached for the beacon, but it was too late. A sound like glass being pressed under a boot filled the room, and all around them the mirrors flickered with static and light. Alice was in a panic, shouting something that Eliot didn’t hear, his eyes darting from one mirror to the next as fuzzy images came into view.

Blurred edges gave way to crystal clarity. Quentin Coldwater stood before him naked as the day he was born. Three identical copies, alike in every way save for their expressions.

One of the Quentins wore a mask of terror, his mouth open in a silent scream, eyes pleading. The next Quentin was detached and calm. The third Quentin had twin streams of tears rushing down his cheeks, his pale body trembling on the other side of the glass.

“Oh. Oh no,” Eliot heard Alice saying distantly. “No, Eliot. No. Your shade. Shit.”

“It’s him,” Eliot said calmly, spinning around and around. “Look. Alice. Three Quentins.”

“Eliot!” Alice sounded like she might be crying. He turned and watched as she pulled the beacon out from underneath the prism, the mirror that held his shade cracked and pulsing with light. “It’s broken. Your shade it’s…”

“Oh…” Eliot crossed to her and snatched the beacon away, snapping the compact shut and shoving it down into his pocket. “Too bad.”

“Eliot, do you realize what—”

Eliot brushed her off, turning to approach one of the Quentins in the mirror. The one whose eyes were wide with terror. “I think he wants us to help him, Alice. How do we get him out?”

“Um…” Alice’s voice quavered, the terrible weight of her emotion spilling off her like a sickness. “The prism… it’s cracked… and I need to...”

Eliot turned his back to the mirror. “You know, Alice, this whole thing would go much faster if you could just get it together. I understand why I lost my magic now...” He walked over to the prism, eyeing the little hairline crack that had spread itself down one side. “I used to think that pain was a necessary part of magic, but now I see…”

He lifted his hands and flexed his fingers, working out the weeks of tension and disuse. He needed to try something quick and simple just to be sure. Ugarte's Prismatic Spray would do. He steepled his fingers and focused his energy, and there between his palms a spectrum of colors blossomed to life.

Ah, there it was. Eliot smiled, the colors drifting away as he broke his hands apart. Reaching for the prism, he didn’t even have to cast to call the thing over to him, watching it land in his palm in the space of a single breath. 

Magic flowed through Eliot now easily as blood through a vein.

“Oh my god,” Alice breathed. “Eliot…”

He’d never been particularly brilliant at mending, but as he traced his finger along the edge of the prism, the crack sealed itself up in one clean motion. “There,” he said, setting it back in its contraption with a flourish of his hands. “I would do the rest but I don’t know the spell.”

Alice nodded, wiping at her eyes. She took a breath and stepped forward, casting with slow and deliberate hands. When the light hit the mirrors this time, the glass began to move and shift, rolling like the surface of a pond reflecting back an image.

Each version of Quentin was forced through the watery glass and out into the world. Naked and trembling, they neither spoke nor moved, three pale ghosts rejected by the dead space that had held them.

Eliot turned his attention back to Alice. “What now?”

Her face was damp with tears, eyes darting between each of the Quentins. “They just need to… hold hands. And I’ll do a binding spell and then—”

“So do it.”

Alice met his gaze, stunned silent for a moment before offering an uncertain nod of her head. She approached the Quentin that had tears streaming down his weary face, carefully as she might a wounded animal.

“Quentin,” she said, reaching for him slowly. “I know that you’re scared. But I’m going to put you back together now, and... then it will be better. Okay?”

He flinched when she took his hand, but allowed himself to be lead over to the Quentin with terror in his eyes. The last Quentin remained as silent as the others when she brought them together, linking their pliant hands. They were practically catatonic, shivering, barely blinking, and when Alice cast the binding spell, three bodies dissolved into one in an instant.

Quentin collapsed onto the floor with a terrible gasp, drawing in great lungfuls of air as though he’d nearly drowned. Alice dropped to her knees and put a hand on his shoulder, but Quentin wrenched away with an animal sound, shielding his face with his arms.

Eliot felt mechanical, unable to identify a single tangible emotion as he watched Quentin shivering there on the floor. He tried to imagine the things he could no longer feel, what he might do with an intact soul and the only man he’d ever loved back from the dead. All those dreadful things, the ache of it all, and the tears. 

Unburdened at last, Eliot could finally be honest with himself: he hadn’t actually expected this to work.

Frowning down at the sight before him, Eliot decided to make himself useful. “I’m going to get him something to wear,” he said, not waiting for a response before heading for the door.

At the Physical Kids’ Cottage, Eliot went to his room, a barren space devoid of nearly all his personal belongings, the bulk of his things having been moved to the penthouse weeks ago. He found enough in the closet at least to pull a pair of slacks and a shirt for Quentin, only realizing on his walk back to the classroom that grabbing Quentin’s clothes from his own room would have been a far more practical choice.

Eliot found Alice and Quentin exactly where he’d left them.

“There’s something wrong with him,” Alice said, her eyes damp and tired. “He won’t look at me, he won’t speak. It’s like he doesn’t even know that I’m here.”

“He’s traumatized, Alice, of course he’s not saying anything.” Eliot studied him carefully, the slump of his shoulders, the way he hugged his knees to his chest, rocking himself a little. “Here.” He tossed her the shirt. “Let’s get him dressed.”

When Alice reached for him this time, Quentin didn’t flinch. “Quentin.” She sounded like she was talking to a child. “Eliot got you some clothes. We’re gonna get you dressed, and then… we can go home.”

“We’ll take him to the cottage,” Eliot said, unfolding the pants and kneeling down next to her. “Just for tonight. Or until he’s no longer... catatonic.”

Quentin’s face was tired and gray, his skin cold under Eliot’s fingers when he began the delicate task of getting him dressed. It was like dressing an infant, he thought, or giant, shivering porcelain doll, and Eliot had to use his newly regained magical abilities to levitate Quentin up off the floor just enough to get the pants up over his ass.

“Can you levitate him all the way to the cottage?” Alice asked, buttoning the shirt up to just under Quentin’s collarbone. It was a shade of dark blue that looked lovely against his skin, even in its current corpse-like state.

“I could, but it would be more effort than it’s worth to do it that way. I’d rather just carry him if he can’t walk.”

Alice shot him an incredulous look. “You mean you’ll levitate him in your arms just enough to take the weight off.”

Eliot offered her an easy smile. “Just enough.”

They sat back on their heels, looking over the sight before them. Quentin looked good in Eliot’s clothes, even if the pant legs and shirt sleeves were entirely too long. Even if his eyes were hollow and his hair was a tangled mess and his skin looked as though it might have turned to glass after spending so long shattered inside of a dead world on the other side of a mirror.

Alice said, “Quentin, can you hear me?” and Quentin didn’t respond. “What if there’s something wrong with him?” she looked to Eliot, the fear in her voice a palpable thing.

_I’m sure that there is,_ Eliot thought, understanding it was probably something he shouldn’t say out loud. “We should get him out of here,” he said, rising to his feet and flexing his hands, the magic tingling in his fingertips just itching to spill out. “I’m sure he just needs a little time.”

Quentin was all deadweight when Eliot scooped him into his arms, but with a little help from a buoyancy spell it was almost like carrying nothing at all. Quentin floated in his arms like water. God, he’d really fucking missed being able to do this. There was nothing in the universe better than being a magician. He vowed to never take it for granted again.

As they made their way out into the hall, Quentin began to stir, lifting his head, for a moment meeting Eliot’s gaze. His eyes bloodshot and glassy, Quentin almost at once retreated, burying his face in the crook of Eliot’s neck, inhaling the scent of him deeply, making a sound that burrowed its way under Eliot’s skin like a fever. Had his shade been in his body just then, not trapped in a broken compact in his pocket, Eliot knew that sound would have spelled his end.

Quentin hooked his arms around Eliot’s neck with a whimper, his breath coming quickly. The walk to the cottage was a slow one, the journey up the stairs once they got there even slower, Alice trailing closely behind, Quentin clinging to him like a lifeline, little sounds escaping his chest every now and then.

Eliot walked to his own room on instinct, and with a little help from Alice he got Quentin inside and deposited onto the bed. After a little struggle with trying to unlock his arms from around Eliot’s neck, they tucked him tightly under the covers with a mountain of pillows cradling his head. Quentin looked right at him and made another sound, like a plea was trying to escape from under his tongue, and then his eyes slid shut with a heavy sigh.

Eliot slipped a hand into his pocket, felt along the ridges of the compact pulsing with his shade, the edges of tiny silver flowers cutting into the pads of his fingers. He looked to Alice and watched fat tears flow silently from her eyes as she turned her back to Quentin, her hands bunching into tight fists beside her.

“I didn’t—” She was trying desperately to speak but kept choking on her words, struggling to keep her sobs quiet and contained. “I didn’t think—”

Eliot turned to her, keeping his voice low. “You didn’t think it would work, did you?”

Alice shook her head.

“Yeah, I didn’t either. Not really. Always was good at lying to myself.” He offered her a smile she couldn’t see, her eyes fixed down on the floor. “Amazing what you can see without any feelings tying you down.”

“I’m so angry, Eliot,” she said, almost too quietly to hear, her whole body trembling and her breath coming out in ragged little puffs.

Eliot thought he understood, but still he said, “Tell me why you’re angry, Alice.”

She sniffled and pulled off her glasses, wiping at her face and eyes before putting them back on again. “Because…” She shook her head and looked to him. “What gave him the right to make that choice? He had no right, Eliot. And then he didn’t even try. It was like he—”

She clipped her words and turned away, but Eliot understood her completely. It was the one thing they’d been dancing around for weeks on end, the one thing too terrible to ever say out loud, to even let form into a complete thought, but Eliot knew. Alice had told him enough.

“It was like he wanted to die,” Eliot said, and it was terrible, even if he couldn’t feel it. 

“Yes.” Alice’s voice was surprisingly calm. Something had burst between them now that the words had been spoken. Something they could never put back again. She almost looked relieved. “Maybe this was a mistake. Bringing him back, I mean.”

“I wouldn’t say that.” Eliot looked to Quentin over his shoulder, his chest rising and falling steadily as he breathed. “Trapped in there… he wasn’t dead. Not the way he was hoping it to mean.”

Alice’s eyes welled with fresh tears threatening to spill over. “I think I need to be alone for a minute.”

“With him?”

“No.” She moved her body closer to the door. “I’ll call Margo, and let her know—”

“Tell her to not tell the others just yet.”

“Why not?” She turned back to him frowning. “Don’t you think they deserve to—”

“No.” Eliot shook his head, watching Quentin’s eyelid flutter. “I don’t. They’ll bother him and he needs to rest.”

“Do you really think you’re in any position to be calling the shots right now, Eliot?”

Eliot cocked his head, sighing contentedly. “I’m more clear-headed now than I’ve ever been, Alice. I’m exactly the one who should be calling the shots.”

She gave him a look that was hard to read—contempt or fear or sadness or some twisted combination of the three—and left the room without a word, pulling the door shut quietly behind her.

Eliot perched on the edge of the bed, studying Quentin’s pale, sleeping face, wondering what he might be dreaming of, if he’d slept or dreamed at all during those weeks he’d spent shattered and trapped. If it had all just been endless, confusing terror, or if there had been good parts of it too, peaceful things, floating in that void of quiet with nothing but his memories.

He reached into his pocket and pulled out the compact, flipping it open just to see the dulling light of his shade struggling in the shattered glass. _That’s who I used to be,_ he thought, mesmerized by the way that it pulsed, a dim blue that almost looked like magic. Almost. But really, it was the opposite, the one thing that had been weighing him down all his life. The softest, weakest part of him that had been broken long before he’d ever thought to have it removed.

Quentin stirred and Eliot snapped the compact shut, shoving it deep into his pocket. He didn’t open his eyes, but Eliot found himself hoping that he would. He desperately wanted to see. Wanted to know what Quentin was feeling, even if he had no capacity himself to feel it back. He wanted Quentin to open his mouth and to speak, to tell him why, after everything, he’d stood in the light of a spark and wished himself to burn.

Eliot sat and stared for a long time, but eventually Alice came back. She brought with her a tray with a bowl of soup and a glass of water, and Eliot couldn’t help but laugh.

“He’s not going to eat that.”

“Well, he needs to eat something,” she said, setting the tray on the nightstand. “Or at least have some water.”

“I thought you were angry with him.” Eliot studied her face, her red and puffy eyes. She’d cried a lot more after she’d left the room, Eliot thought, probably in the kitchen. Maybe the soup was an afterthought, or a distraction. Giving her hands something to do other than catching her tears.

“Just because I’m angry doesn’t mean that I don’t want him to be okay.” She scowled, keeping her voice low. “Jesus, Eliot, an hour without your shade and already you’ve forgotten what it’s like to care about someone.”

“I haven’t forgotten.” He let his eyes scan over Quentin’s sleeping body. “Why do you think I’m still here?”

“Look, I know you can’t feel anything now, but you promised you weren’t going to be a dick anymore, and this doesn’t get you off the hook.”

Eliot sighed. “I’m sorry. Well… Okay.” His body shook in a silent laugh. “That’s a lie. That would imply that I care... which I don’t. But, I know that I should? And I can understand that even if I can’t feel it. So… I’ll keep myself in check, okay?”

She nodded. “Good. Now help me wake him up.”

“He’s tired, Alice, we should—” She glared at him, furrowing her brows, and Eliot threw his hands up. “Fine.”

Gently, Eliot placed his hand on the curve of Quentin’s leg through the covers. “Q,” he said, barely above a whisper, giving his leg a little squeeze when Quentin didn’t respond.

“Q,” Alice said softly, stroking the backs of her fingers feather-light over his brow. “Quentin, can you hear me?”

Quentin breathed in deeply upon waking, exhaling on a whimper, his eyes fluttering open briefly before snapping shut. He turned his face away from them, his expression twisting itself into something resembling abject misery.

“Q,” Eliot said, pulling his hand away. “Alice thinks… we think you should try and have something to eat. Or maybe just a little water. Hm?”

Quentin’s eyes fluttered open again, his hooded gaze darting between Eliot and Alice. He swallowed, parting his lips to speak, but all that came out was a broken little sound that Eliot knew would have left him in pieces had he any heart left to shatter.

Alice took the glass of water and brought it to Quentin’s lips, cradling the back of his head and meeting no resistance. He struggled with the mechanics of it at first, as though the connection between his brain and his mouth had gotten tangled somehow, but soon enough he got the hang of it, and when Alice pulled the glass away he’d drained every last drop from inside, chasing it like he couldn’t get enough.

“Okay, hey,” Alice sat down beside him on the bed, her back to Eliot, stroking a hand down the side of Quentin’s face. “That’s enough for now. Are you hungry?”

Quentin only groaned. 

Eliot pulled himself to his feet, uninterested in sitting by and watching Alice nurse Quentin back to health. “I think I’ll go for now,” he said, already halfway to the door.

“You’re leaving?” She sounded terrified.

“Just downstairs. You two should…” _He’s your boyfriend,_ Eliot wanted to bite, but didn’t. Instead he shot her a tight smile. “Call if you need me, okay?”

He didn’t wait for a response, though he thought he heard Quentin let out a pointed groan in his direction before pulling the door shut in his wake. He made for the stairs but stopped in his tracks halfway, turning on his heels and heading back down the hall, stopping outside the door to Quentin’s room. 

The air in the room was stale when he pushed inside. Eliot swiped a finger along the top of Quentin’s desk and watched as a dark trail formed in its wake, then cast a quick cleaning spell to take care of the dust and the stench. 

The closet was mostly filled with empty hangers now, though a few of Quentin’s things remained. One of his soft old sweaters that reminded Eliot of beginnings, of the very first week of Quentin’s first year, late night fumbled conversations over cigarettes and too much wine. 

He pulled the sweater from its hanger and carried it over to the bed, flopping down on the edge and bunching it tightly in his hands, bringing it to his nose and breathing in the scent of long forgotten days. Eliot looked around the room. It was funny, he thought, how a person could be gone from a place for so long yet the shape of them remained. In every corner like a haunting, little pieces of them scattered like confetti on the air. 

Eliot tossed the sweater down on the bed and went over to the desk, flipping open an old spiral notebook with Quentin’s name scrawled on the cover, the pages inside covered in half-finished first year spells, hands and phases of the moon, jaunty little animals in the margins wearing crowns. And there were faces there too, though not very well done, but well enough that they were almost recognizable. Eliot thought one of them might have been his own.

He shut the notebook and went back to the bed, curling up on his side and loosely cradling the sweater in his arms. The immediate comfort when he shut his eyes was the strangest thing, nothing dancing behind his eyelids but the beautiful, rolling dark. No terror and no dread, no worrying about what was yet to come. It was a glorious nothing, and Eliot drifted in it, finding dreamless sleep easily as breathing.

He woke several hours later to dark, clutching Quentin’s sweater in his hands like a lifeline, his body aching when he pulled himself to his feet, but his mind blissfully rested. He left the sweater there on the bed and went back to his room down the hall. Quentin was alone and fast asleep when he stepped inside, curled in on himself with the covers half hanging from his body, a small illumination spell burning in the corner and striking his skin in shades of amber and gold.

He shut the door and leaned against it, watching Quentin rest and feeling nothing, the way his limbs dangled off the side of the bed dredging up a distant memory from the corner of Eliot’s mind.

Teddy, their son—the son that existed between them only in the hollow echo of shared remembrance—as a toddler had been a wild sleeper, tossing and turning every which way in the night, waking on the floor tangled in his quilt more often than he’d wake in his bed. Eliot reached for a moment in time, holding it close, and deep inside he swore he could almost feel it.

Quentin woke to find Teddy on the floor. “He gets this from you, you know,” he said laughing softly, looking back to Eliot where he sat on the edge of their bed.

“I have never woken up on a floor in my life.” Eliot grinned, stretching the sleep from his limbs with a sigh.

Quentin scooped a still sleeping Teddy up into his arms, groaning at the weight of him. He’d grown so much in the months since Arielle’s passing. “You sure about that?”

Eliot shrugged. “Okay. You got me there. But he gets the snoring from you.”

Quentin huffed out a laugh and deposited a still sound asleep Teddy back into his tiny bed. Eliot was convinced their son would sleep through the end of the world.

“You know...” Quentin crossed the short distance between them and tangled his fingers in Eliot’s hair. “He’s probably not going to wake up for a while still.”

Eliot slipped his arms around Quentin and pulled him near, parting his legs to make a space for him. “I’m aware,” he said with a smile, skirting his fingers along the waistband of his soft pants, but not pushing inside. There was no need for rushing in these moments.

“Kiss me,” Quentin whispered, taking Eliot’s face in his hands, leaning down and slotting their parted lips together.

Eliot sighed and let the memory drift away. Quietly, he went to Quentin and pulled the covers back up over his sleeping body before leaving the room. He found Alice down in the kitchen, staring into a glass of water that was sweating in soft drops on the counter.

“He’s still sleeping,” Eliot said, getting a glass from the cabinet and filling it at the sink.

“That’s good,” Alice said, sounding exhausted, swirling her finger over the glass, the water inside spiraling up to meet her, a tiny storm growing in her palm. She snatched her hand away and the magic died, the water sloshing back down into the glass.

Eliot gulped down his water and set his glass in the sink. “So I was thinking that maybe I should leave,” he said just to see her reaction.

“I still need your help with him,” she said, raising her eyes to his.

“No you don’t. You’re his girlfriend. You’ll figure it out.”

“Eliot, you’re being a dick again,” she snapped, though there was no anger in her face. She only looked tired and sad.

“I’m not. It’s the truth, Alice. You’re his girlfriend. You care about him. I’m—”

“You care or you wouldn’t still be here. You said it yourself.”

Eliot felt the line of the compact through his pants, circling the edge of it with his finger. “Do you think it’s really broken? My shade, I mean.”

“Yes.” There was no hesitation, her expression twisting with a dizzying mix of emotions. “I told you how dangerous it was and you didn’t care.”

Eliot shrugged. “It never did me much good anyway.”

“That’s not true.” Her hand trembled as it curled around her water glass. “You loved people. You loved Quentin enough to… give everything. You loved him. You were in love with him.”

“Being in love with him didn’t do me much good either.” Eliot averted his gaze. “Better he have you than a coward.”

“Why do you assume that I want to…” Alice’s voice grew quiet. “Have him.”

He let his eyes fall over her again. “You were together when he died. Not-died. Shattered. Whatever. You’re his girlfriend.”

“I wish you would stop saying that.”

Eliot smirked. “Would you prefer to be his widow again?”

The disgust on Alice’s face was palpable. “Maybe you should just go if this is how you’re going to act.”

Leaving just then would have been the easiest thing, but something gnawing deep inside told Eliot that he needed to stay. Not a feeling in his belly, but an anchor, a steady weight tugging at the parts of him that remained. Something in his bones that he couldn’t shake, an itch he couldn’t hope to reach even with the strongest magic.

“I shouldn’t have said that,” Eliot conceded. “I’m trying.”

She said, “Try harder,” her voice breaking with the promise of tears.

“I’ll go,” he said. “I’m not leaving. I’ll just… leave you alone now.”

He went to the common room and poured himself a drink, sparking the fireplace to life with a flourish of his hand, the magic flowing through him in easy waves. He sat staring into the flames, the cottage quiet and his head calm, and Eliot couldn’t recall a time when he’d ever felt so content.

But there was a wrongness stirring in the air. Stewing in his misery for all those weeks, he’d dreamed of nothing more frequently than this moment. And now here he was, Quentin alive and not exactly well, but sleeping peacefully upstairs in his bed, and Eliot couldn’t pin down a single recognizable emotion for the occasion.

It was a tragedy, he thought, or maybe just terribly ironic. The compact in his pocket that held the discarded piece of his soul was warm to the touch, and Eliot considered seriously just tossing it into the fire and watching it burn. 

It was only the part of him that understood the heart he couldn’t feel that stilled his hand, keeping the fire at bay.

—

Eliot went to his room before dawn, finding Quentin sitting up in his bed, hair wild and face surprisingly calm. Alice sat at the foot of the bed, observing him quietly. 

“He still won’t speak,” she said. “But… is this progress?”

“Well, he’s upright. That’s something.”

Eliot pulled the desk chair over and sat down in it. “Q,” he said, and Quentin met his gaze, “we need you to say something if you can. So that we know… you’re okay in there. Do you remember what happened?”

Quentin frowned, shaking his head slowly after a long moment of silence.

“Okay,” Alice said, drawing Quentin’s attention. “That’s something. Do you remember who you are, Quentin?”

Quentin nodded slowly, but it felt more like a question. Like there were pieces still kicking around in there that couldn’t entirely be sure.

“Q.” Quentin looked back to Eliot with a frown. “Can you tell me the last thing you remember before…”

_Before you killed yourself,_ he wanted to say, biting back the words and feeling quite proud of his restraint.

Quentin swallowed and his jaw worked, like he was trying to remember how to move his tongue. He parted his lips slowly, tears springing in his eyes, his face twisting in silent agony.

“It’s okay,” Alice said, but when she reached for him Quentin wrenched away, as though he’d just been burned. Drawing her hand back into her lap, she shot Eliot a frown.

“Take your time,” Eliot said flatly, looking to Alice. “I don’t want to take him back to the penthouse just yet.”

“I think that’s a good idea,” she said, her voice sounding as shattered as she looked. “What if he’s not…”

He watched as Quentin turned his back and curled in on himself. “He’ll be all right.” Eliot shrugged. “Or he won’t. There’s nothing we can do for him right now.”

Tears welled in Alice’s tired eyes. “There has to be something,” she said.

“Just… give it time,” he said, watching as she took off her glasses and buried her face in her hands.

He said, “You should sleep,” and she said, “I did,” and Eliot knew she was lying.

He left her there sulking at the foot of the bed, headed down to the kitchen to make breakfast for three, even if he was certain Quentin wouldn’t eat it. Bacon and eggs and thick slices of french toast that he covered in too much powdered sugar for Alice’s sake. It was something the Eliot who could feel things would have done, even if the Eliot he had become didn’t care if she enjoyed it.

He set the table and shot her a text, then waited patiently for her to dry her eyes and come downstairs.

Her face was red and puffy when she came into the room. “He went back to sleep,” she said, taking the seat across from him. “But we should—”

“We’ll take him some when we’re finished. I enchanted it so it’ll stay warm. Go on. You need to eat.”

Alice eyed him suspiciously. “Why are you being nice to me?”

“Because it’s what I should be doing.” He stabbed a bit of egg with the tines of his fork. “Eat.”

Alice doused her french toast in syrup and stuffed bite after bite into her mouth until her plate was empty. “That was good,” she said, dabbing at her mouth with a napkin. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.” Eliot pushed back from the table, contentedly full after finishing only half his food, grabbing the plate he’d made up for Quentin. “You coming?”

“Of course.”

Eliot carried the plate upstairs, Alice trailing close behind clutching a glass of water. Quentin was still curled up with his back to the door when they entered, waking to the sound of their voices when they called his name, turning away from the offer of food and drink with a scowl. 

Alice seemed particularly hurt by his refusal of the bacon.

Eliot sat on the edge of the bed, daring to touch the curve of his shoulder, solid and warm and alive under his shirt. Quentin didn’t shy away, the point of contact between them easy and thrumming with energy. Eliot didn’t know if it was a feeling, but he thought he might never want to pull his hand away.

They sat with him until the sun came up, and as the first light of morning slipped its way in through the curtains, Eliot had an idea.

Crossing to the dresser, he retrieved the hand mirror that was still where he’d left it however many months or years ago. It was some heavy gilded thing, all flash and scrollwork, with tiny gems inlaid into the metal. Eliot had bought it on a whim during his first year, on a trip into the city with Margo. In truth, he’d picked it because it reminded him of one that Roland gifted him during their time spent together, one of countless beautiful things he’d showered Eliot with in exchange for his company. It was easier to admit that now.

Eliot called Quentin’s name and watched him stir, carrying the mirror over to him on the bed. “Sit up for me, Q,” he said, slipping an arm up under his shoulders and helping him get upright.

Alice eyed him curiously. “What are you doing?”

“We need him to remember who he is,” Eliot said, studying Quentin’s puffy eyes, his wild hair, perching next to him on the bed.

Alice sat in the chair next to them. “He said he remembers who he is.”

“I don’t think that he does. Not really.” Eliot reached out and placed a hand on Quentin’s shoulder. It was a natural movement, like their bodies were meant to be touching. “Q. I’m going to hold up this mirror, and I want you to look at yourself. Can you do that for me?”

Quentin knitted his brows tightly together, nodding slowly, not breaking Eliot’s gaze for a second. Eliot raised the mirror and watched as Quentin’s eyes drifted to his own reflection, and for a moment he looked terrified. As the seconds ticked by, Quentin relaxed into it, studying his face in the glass, reaching up to touch his sallow face, the tangled mess of his hair.

“That’s good, Q. Now I want you to listen to me carefully, all right? Nod if you understand.” Quentin nodded, and Eliot smirked. “Good. Look at your eyes. Your name is Quentin Makepeace Coldwater. You’re twenty-seven years old, give or take a few months here and there. Time gets a little screwy blipping between worlds as often as we have.”

Quentin’s eyes darted to him for a second, and Eliot thought he caught the briefest glimpse of a smile.

Eliot continued, “You’re a magician, a good one, someone who uses what he has to fix what he can. When you were a boy you loved the Fillory books more than anything, and then you grew up to become a king who sat on the throne in Whitespire. We both were kings… for a little while at least. And Alice was a queen. Do you remember?”

His eyes still locked on the mirror, Quentin shrugged.

“It’s okay. Just keep looking. You’re not just a good magician, Quentin, you’re a good man.” Eliot paused to watch the emotion welling in Quentin’s eyes. “One of the best. Look at yourself. Do you see it? You’re kind, and determined, and brave. A loyal friend… a fucking spectacular lay.”

At his side, Alice let out the faintest whisper of a laugh, and Eliot couldn’t help but smile. Quentin looked up from the mirror with confusion and hope in his eyes.

“We’re not done yet,” Eliot said firmly, watching Quentin’s eyes drift back to his reflection. His arm was starting to ache, so he cast a quick spell to levitate the mirror in place on its own. “Keep looking. You are Quentin. Makepeace. Coldwater.”

Eliot thought of the mosaic, of those fifty years that existed only between the two of them, but stopped himself short of mentioning it. If Quentin’s face was anything to go on, focusing on one life was overwhelming enough.

Eliot took a breath and repeated Quentin’s name. “Can you say it for me? Can you tell me who you are?”

Quentin parted his lips, his throat clicking dryly. Alice reached for the glass of water on the bedside table and he snatched it from her hands, gulping all of it down without any assistance this time.

Eliot sent the empty glass away with a sweep of his hand. “Better? Go on. Try it again.”

Quentin breathed deeply and gazed down at his own hands, half-covered by the sleeves of Eliot’s shirt. Folding his fingers in to brush along the cuffs, reverent, he lost himself in the touch for a moment, but when he raised his eyes to the mirror they were just a little brighter.

Swallowing slowly, he let his lips fall open. “I’m…” The word came out all broken, an uncertain fragment of itself, and Eliot nodded his encouragement, patiently waiting for Quentin to continue.

“I’m...” he started again, a little clearer this time, a shuddering, tearful gasp splitting its way out of his chest. It sounded like a revelation, and made Eliot’s pulse pick up a little. “Quentin… Fuck.” Quentin breathed deeply, eyes going wide. “My name is Quentin Makepeace… Coldwater. _Fuck._ ”

Beside him, Alice made a sound that was as much laughter as sorrow. “Quentin. Oh my god.”

“Alice,” Quentin said, shifting his tearful gaze between the two of them. “Eliot…”

“There you are.” Eliot laughed, and it was a relief. Was relief a feeling? If it was, Eliot felt it then. He sent the mirror back over to the dresser with a sweep of his hand. “So you remember… everything?”

Quentin shook his head slowly. “No, it’s uh… a lot of broken pieces. I don’t… I know that something happened, but…”

“It’s okay,” Alice pushed forward, reaching out a hand, stopping herself short of making contact. “It’s… you just… have to give it time,” she said, sinking back into the chair.

“What’s the last thing you remember?” Eliot asked, only realizing then that his hand had curled itself loosely around Quentin’s leg through the blanket.

Quentin shook his head. “You were… gone. I think I was trying to save you. Wait...” Quentin’s face lit up. “The Monster. From the castle. You were... possessed?”

“I was.”

“But you’re okay now?”

_You have no idea,_ Eliot thought. “I am,” Eliot said.

Quentin stared down in the direction of his hands, fidgeting with the cuffs of Eliot’s shirt. “What did I do,” he said, almost too quietly to make out. Eliot had to lean in closely to hear. “How did I end up... in there?”

Eliot looked to Alice. Even without the burden of his emotions, he had no idea how they should proceed. Too much at once, and he knew they risked sending Quentin back into catatonic silence. He deserved to know what had happened, what he’d done, there was no doubt, even if the memories never came to him, but now was certainly not the time.

“How about,” Eliot said, his gaze flicking between Alice and Quentin, “we wait. For now. See what comes back to you? I don’t want—”

“Did I do something terrible?” Quentin raised his damp eyes to him, and Eliot was thankful that he couldn’t feel it. “Tell me what I did.”

“You—” Alice began, stopping when Eliot shot her a look. “We just have to... give it time.”

Quentin flopped down onto his back, nestling his head into the mountain of pillows with a sigh. Time was a funny thing, Eliot thought, what it saw fit to give and what it took away, memory itself more often a burden than a gift. It wasn’t so bad when you couldn’t feel it, when where your heart should be there sat wondrous void, but to feel and not remember? To have that ache clawing its way out of your chest with just an empty space accompanying it in your mind? Eliot could hardly imagine anything worse.

They sat in silence for a moment. Then Alice said, “You really should eat something, you know.”

Quentin mumbled, “Not really hungry.”

Alice stood and snatched the plate from the bedside table, “Well, you should at least try,” she said. The warming enchantment had a short life. She poked at the bacon with a frown. “I’m gonna go make you something else.”

The door clicked shut, announcing her departure, and Eliot saw it on his face, Quentin’s primal urge to hide away, to crawl back into himself until his shattered pieces slipped into the quiet, comforting dark. Eliot knew that urge too well.

Rising to his feet, he said, “I’d like to try something else.”

Quentin groaned, tossing an arm over his eyes. “I’m tired. Whatever it is can wait.”

“You won’t have to do anything.” Eliot was already making his way to the door. “Just… give me a minute. I’ll be right back.”

If he had a response to that, Eliot didn’t hear it, already out the door and making his way down the hall to Quentin’s room. He dug around in barren drawers and scoured the half-empty bookshelf and rummaged through the closet with no luck. It wasn’t until he started pulling boxes out from under the bed that he found what he was looking for.

It wasn’t Quentin’s prized first-edition of _The World in the Walls,_ but a well-worn fiftieth anniversary paperback with a crude illustration of Jane Chatwin on the cover, and it would serve his purpose just as well. Satisfied, Eliot shoved the boxes back under the bed and slipped out into the hall with the book tucked tightly to his chest.

Eliot found Quentin curled up on his side when he returned, and he and promptly took him by the shoulder. “Quentin. You can’t go to sleep right now,” he said. “Come on. Move over. Make a little room.”

Quentin huffed his annoyance but didn’t protest, moving himself to the middle of the bed and flopping down onto his back. “What are you doing?” he asked, shooting Eliot a frown as he slipped in next to him.

“I’m reading you a bedtime story.”

“You said I couldn’t go to sleep.”

Eliot crossed his legs and settled back against the pillows, the line of his body on top of the covers pressed firmly to Quentin’s still below. “You can’t. But maybe after if you feel like it. Right now I just need you to listen.”

Quentin studied the book in his hand. “Okay,” he said, then waited patiently for Eliot to begin.

Eliot flipped open the battered cover, smiling at the abundance of marginalia and highlighting on the page as he began to read. “The Chatwin Twins and their older brother had been sent to the countryside. From a young age, Martin Chatwin had a gloomy nature. And to combat his melancholy, he would lose himself in stories of wonder…”

He hadn’t made it halfway through the first chapter when Quentin’s head made contact with his shoulder. “Don’t fall asleep,” he said, glancing at him from the corner of one eye.

“I’m not sleeping,” Quentin mumbled, quite unconvincingly, but Eliot didn’t argue. 

In truth, he didn’t want to. He supposed he didn’t need a shade to enjoy the comfort of being close. Or specifically, the comfort of being close to Quentin. He continued reading in a measured tone until Alice returned, bringing with her a plate stacked high with crispy bacon. Had there even been that much left in the kitchen? For a moment he was genuinely amazed.

Eliot dog-eared the page and shut the book, huffing out a laugh. “Seriously?”

“What?” She frowned. “Everybody loves bacon.”

Quentin lifted his head and stared at the plate in her hands. “Are you hungry?” Eliot asked, and Quentin answered with a shrug. 

Alice looked lost and uncertain, and Eliot sighed, understanding at least the concept of taking pity. “Come on, Alice,” he said. “Sit on the bed with us.”

She eyed him with suspicion. “What?”

“I said sit on the bed.” Eliot tucked his legs up underneath himself to make room. “Come on. Bring the bacon.”

If she wanted to smile at that, she did a good job of suppressing the urge, climbing onto the bed without a sound and setting the plate between them. And for a moment, no one made a move, and Eliot couldn’t help but laugh. Was finding humor in awkward situations an emotion? He genuinely couldn’t be sure.

“Okay,” Eliot broke the silence with a smile. “Eat your bacon, Q. Go on.”

Quentin’s eyes drifted between the two of them and the plate, but this time there came no protest. Tentatively, he leaned forward and snatched up a single strip, bringing it to his lips and taking the tiniest bite he could manage, chewing slowly and looking more than a little uncertain.

Quentin swallowed, making a muted, happy sound, and Eliot couldn’t help but smile, watching him take another bite, this one a little bigger than the first.

Though Eliot saw no need for gluttony now, he decided to join in anyway, and the three of them sat there eating in companionable silence until the plate was empty. It lifted Alice’s spirits considerably, and Eliot knew there was a story there, one he might even get out of her if he pressed. Instead, he shot her a knowing look and she averted her gaze, licking the grease from her fingers with a blush creeping over her face.

Eliot smirked and did a tut, sending the empty plate across the room, letting out a heavy sigh as he looked to Quentin. “Better?”

“A little,” he said quietly, sucking on the pad of his thumb. “Will you read to me some more?”

Eliot couldn’t deny him.

Alice moved to the chair, and Eliot picked up where they’d left off, following Jane and Martin through the Southern Orchard, a talking rabbit speaking to them in poetry and riddles.

“They’re going on a quest,” Quentin said very quietly.

“Soon,” Eliot said even quieter, turning the page.

Quentin sighed against Eliot’s shoulder. “Christopher Plover is the real villain of this story, isn’t he?”

Eliot paused. “You remember that?”

“Yes. I remembered it just now... when you were reading.”

“Oh... I’m sorry,” Eliot said, and he could almost be certain that he meant it. It was something deeper than a feeling. Something ingrained in his marrow that didn’t want Quentin to suffer.

“It’s okay. I’d rather know,” Quentin said, settling in a little closer. “You can keep reading now.”

And Eliot did. He read until Quentin was snoring on his shoulder and Jane and Martin’s quest was nearly through. He shut the book and looked over to Alice, nodding off in her chair.

Yawning, she asked, “Can we tell the others now?”

Eliot tossed the book down onto the bed. “We’ll see if he wants to go back to the penthouse tomorrow.”

“We can’t just spring it on them, they deserve to know—”

“By them you mean Julia, right?” Eliot huffed out a laugh. “Because Margo already knows, and the only other people in the world who give a fuck about him are in this room.”

“That’s not fair,” she said.

“Maybe not.” Eliot looked over at Quentin’s sleeping face. “But it’s the truth.”

Without a word, Alice pulled herself to her feet and left the room. Eliot resisted the urge to shake Quentin awake, to grill him about his memories, to see if the reading of his most cherished story had brought anymore of his shattered pieces back together in his mind. Instead, he slipped out of the bed and helped Quentin get comfortable, drawing the curtains and leaving him alone in the dark.

Eliot went outside and smoked a cigarette, did magic tricks that made colors burst and lightning dance on the air just because he could. He took the compact with his busted shade out of his pocket and sat staring at the cracks, cast a minor mending spell that he was never any good at just to watch as it wouldn’t take.

He formed a miniature storm cloud out in the yard, leaning back in his chair, smoke pouring from his mouth as the rain began to fall.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Decided to post this chapter a bit early because it's my birthday and I can. There was a LOT going on in this one, but I think breaking something vital in order to fix a problem is pretty On Brand for just about every member of the garbage coven. The title of next week's chapter is "Home" but it could just as easily be "Eliot Waugh is an idiot with or without his shade." Thank you to everyone still reading and commenting. Y'all are the best. <3


	4. Home

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They let Quentin sleep through the evening and well into the night. Eliot supposed that living in stasis between worlds, shattered into pieces for weeks on end, really took it out of a person. Alice woke him at one in the morning, asked if he wanted to go home, and Quentin frowned in the light of the illumination spell hovering overhead. 
> 
> “What home do you mean?”
> 
> “The penthouse, Quentin,” she said, hope sparking in her voice and then fading away. “You know.”

They let Quentin sleep through the evening and well into the night. Eliot supposed that living in stasis between worlds, shattered into pieces for weeks on end, really took it out of a person. Alice woke him at one in the morning, asked if he wanted to go home, and Quentin frowned in the light of the illumination spell hovering overhead. 

“What home do you mean?”

“The penthouse, Quentin,” she said, hope sparking in her voice and then fading away. “You know.”

“Oh…” Quentin looked between her and Eliot with a thousand questions in his eyes. “Right. Okay. Yeah, let’s go.”

Eliot was fully prepared to levitate him out of the cottage when Quentin pulled himself out of bed and stood up on his own, albeit a bit unsteadily, clinging to Eliot’s arm to keep himself upright. Alice went to his room down the hall, found a pair of shoes and some socks, and together they got them on his feet. Quentin could walk, but slowly, and he had to hold onto the railing tightly with Eliot steadying him on the other side to make it down the stairs.

“I’ll be right back,” Eliot said when they’d reached the front door, turning on his heels and all but running back up the stairs, laser-focused on the task before him. He went to Quentin’s room, snatched the sweater from the bed, shoved it down into an empty duffle that he found in the closet.

He didn’t think about what he was doing, Eliot just did it, mechanically but with a purpose he couldn’t shake, and Alice eyed him suspiciously when he came back down, gaze darting between his face and the bag on his shoulder. 

“What are you doing?” 

“Nothing. Let’s go.”

Professor Sunderland portaled them into an alleyway near the penthouse, and Eliot stepped through first, helping Quentin wobble over the slightly uneven doorway, holding him steady on the other side as Alice followed after. She looped her arm in Quentin’s as the portal closed, and immediately started to worry—about Julia mostly, and what she might say if her dead best friend suddenly showed up at the door without warning—and continued doing so for the duration of their short journey home.

“I’m just saying,” she said when they stepped off the elevator, “it would be a big shock to think someone is gone and then suddenly they’re not.”

“Julia’s seen a lot of strange shit, Alice,” Eliot said, focusing on the careful movement of Quentin’s feet and legs as they walked, the way that every now and then he had to rest his full weight against Eliot to keep from tipping over.

Alice didn’t respond to that, but insisted on going in first, leaving the two of them there in the hall, Quentin all but collapsing against Eliot’s side as the door clicked shut. Eliot leaned against the wall and drew him near, tucking Quentin’s head under his chin, allowing himself for a moment to relax into the closeness.

“You okay?” he asked, pressing his hands firmly to the slope of Quentin’s back.

Quentin sighed into his neck. “Just… really tired.”

It was nice, the weight of his body and the warmth. That wasn’t something that a person needed emotions to appreciate, Eliot supposed. He had only just let his eyes drift shut, his hands rubbing circles into Quentin’s back, when Alice returned, startling him back to reality.

“Margo...” she said, eyeing them with a frown as Eliot separated Quentin from his chest. “Uh… Margo’s the only one here.”

“Good,” Eliot said, pulling Quentin against his side and holding him firmly in place. “Can you walk?”

“Yeah,” Quentin breathed, allowing Alice to hook herself up under his other arm. “Just… take it slow.”

The penthouse glowed with a dim orange light from the fireplace, and Margo stood by the spiral staircase, watching in disbelief as the three of them tottered inside. Quentin dislodged himself with some effort and stood on his own unsteadily for a moment, and Eliot dropped his duffle by the door, offering him an arm again when he started to wobble.

“Holy fuck, Coldwater,” Margo said, surging forward to meet them, stopping herself short when she got close enough to see his face.

“Be careful with him,” Alice said, standing off to the side and worrying her hands together.

Margo shot Eliot a look. “He all there?”

“Mostly,” Eliot said, Quentin’s fingers digging into the flesh of his arm in a way that bordered on painful. “It’s taken a lot out of him.”

She narrowed her eyes, searching Eliot’s face, resting her hands on her hips. “From the looks of it he’s not the only one.”

“Quentin,” Alice said softly, “do you remember Margo?”

“Of course he remembers me.” Margo offered him a smirk that quickly faded. “Right, Coldwater?”

Quentin loosened his grip on Eliot’s arm, taking in his surroundings with an uncertain expression. “I remember you,” he said absently. “But I only remember this place… a little.”

He pulled away from Eliot slowly, and Alice helped lead him over to the sofa as Margo took Eliot by the wrist, tugging him in the direction of the kitchen. Eliot didn’t protest, her grip as firm as her voice when she spoke.

“We’re talking,” she said. “Now.”

Eliot took a seat at the counter, watching Margo glare at him from the other side. “What did Alice tell you?” he asked, seeing in her eyes that she didn’t know, at least not any of the details.

“She said you got Quentin back. I didn’t know if I believed her, but,” she gestured in the general direction of the living room, “there the fucker is.”

“There the fucker is,” Eliot drawled, waiting for her to continue.

“She also said you did something stupid. Which could mean anything, really. I mean... it’s you.”

Eliot studied the subtle shift in her expression with a smile, the way she masked the depth of her concern, but only just barely. “Did she say what that something stupid was?”

“You think if she did I’d be standing here with my twat in my hand waiting for you to tell me?”

Eliot smirked. “I’m alive. So is Quentin. And Alice. Whatever it was doesn’t matter, so you can stop worrying now.”

“Bullshit.” She frowned, narrowing her eyes. “Tell me what you did. How is he standing here right now, Eliot?”

Eliot shrugged. “He was in the Mirror World. We got him out.”

“How did you get him out?” Her voice quavered in a way that would have cut straight to the quick back when Eliot still had anything inside that could be bothered to care. “El…”

Eliot made a decision right then, knowing she would press until she got to the truth anyway. Deep inside him, something stirred. He could hardly wait to see her reaction. “I took out my shade,” he said, and her eyes went wide with terror.

“You what?”

“It didn’t hurt at all.” He laughed. “I thought it would, but it—”

“That’s not what I asked,” she said through gritted teeth, and even in the dim light he could see the panic growing in her eyes. “El. Just...” She took a breath, pressing her hands to the countertop. “Tell me that you put it back.”

“Can’t,” he said, hopping to his feet and rounding the counter, feeling light and entirely unburdened. “Busted. Please tell me we have sparkling water, I’m—”

“Eliot.” Margo stopped him in his tracks, pressing a hand firmly to his chest. Eliot could feel her trembling. “You’re fucking with me, right?”

“Why would I fuck with you?” He pushed past her and opened the fridge. “You don’t have to worry, I’m fine. Better, actually. Not dead, not a monster... not thinking about jumping off the balcony or swallowing every pill in that little box of mine if only I could just work up the nerve to—”

“Eliot!” she cried at his back, groping at the sleeve of his shirt.

He pulled a bottle of plain water from the fridge with a sigh, turning to her. “You shouldn’t cry for me. I’m perfect now. Jesus, Margo, you saw what a mess I was.”

“You were a mess because you were in love with Coldwater.” She swiped a tear from her cheek with the back of her hand. “And don’t look at me like I didn’t know.” Her voice cracked, a pathetic little sound slipping out of her throat. “How are you supposed to love anyone now that you’re missing your goddamn soul, Eliot.”

“Don’t be so maudlin. It’s not my soul.” He cracked open the water and took a sip. “It’s a piece of my soul, and not one that I actually need to live. Love isn’t a prerequisite for survival.” He smiled. “I’m quite enjoying it, actually.”

Margo watched him intently, and he could see the gears turning behind her eyes as she tried to pull it together. “Okay, so it’s busted,” she said, breathing deep and straightening her back. “Busted shit can be fixed. Where is it? I wanna see.”

Eliot chugged down the rest of his water, crushed the empty bottle, tossing it into the trash. “Doesn’t matter. It can’t be fixed.” He laughed. “Look, this is going to be great. Tomorrow I’ll go to Fillory and get you unbanished. Then we can be us again. Like old times. Only better.”

Margo frowned, gazing out into the living room, at the backs of the two heads popping up from the shadows. “What about Coldwater?”

“What about him? He’s got Alice. He’ll be fine.” 

“Not what I mean, El.” She gave him a hard look. “Be real with me for one second.”

“Look...” Eliot took her by the shoulders, and for a moment she looked terrified, trembling under his heavy gaze, the curve of his hands holding her firmly in place. “She’s who he’s supposed to be with. You and I both know that’s true. And whatever I felt for him before…” He brushed a strand of hair away from her brow with a careful finger. “I can’t feel it now anyway.”

She swallowed, seeming to shrink in on herself more by the second. “Okay…”

Eliot frowned down at her, though he had to force the expression. Deep inside, Eliot could feel nothing but contentment. “Are you afraid of me, Margo?”

“How the fuck else am I supposed to feel right now, El?”

Eliot pulled away, watching the moment her breathing returned, the way her shoulders relaxed away from his touch. The emotions spilling from her were heavy on the air like a cloud, full and threatening to burst.

“You should feel happy,” he said with a shrug. “You’ll see. Tomorrow will be like a brand new start. One without all the useless trauma and dead friends.”

Margo turned her back to him then, gripping the edge of the counter, the tension visible in every line of her body, though she did her best to keep her sobs contained. Eliot pressed a kiss to the top of her head, making her flinch, before he walked away.

Eliot passed through the living room gently, doing his best not to disturb Alice and Quentin on the sofa, snatching up the duffle that he’d dropped by the door on his way. Tucked away safely in his room, Eliot turned on the lights with a flick of his wrist and took out Quentin’s sweater, smoothing it out on the foot of the bed, trying to make sense of his actions. It was something he would have done when he still had feelings, back when Quentin was gone. But Quentin was alive, and Eliot couldn’t feel a thing, and with no emotions to tie it to now, he wondered if he were simply going through the motions of some old, sacred ritual.

He turned away and stripped off his clothes, tucking the compact that held his busted shade into the box on the dresser, going to the bathroom and hopping into the shower. The warm spray felt like heaven on his skin, and Eliot jerked off thinking of nothing and no one at all, just because he could. And if pleasure were an emotion, Eliot felt it more surely than he’d ever felt anything, wringing out every last drop of his release all over his fist with a heavy, contented sigh. 

When his shower was through he toweled himself off and trudged back over to the bed, snatching up the sweater and taking it with him as he curled up under the covers. Eliot turned off the light but didn’t sleep for a long time, drifting on a wave of placid silence, the sweater soft and warm against his face.

When finally dreams did come, they were shapeless things. Quiet, comforting dark. Eliot woke to the morning sun with an easy yawn, the sweater curled halfway around his neck like a lover’s arms. 

He hung the sweater in his closet, tucked in between two of his own favorite shirts, and went to the bathroom to shave his face and style his hair. Eliot made himself beautiful, carefully choosing his outfit for the day: shirt, tie, vest, slacks. He matched his belt to his shoes and dabbed cologne on the curve of his neck, looking himself over in the mirror with a smile.

Eliot found Quentin and Julia in the living room, holding hands on the sofa as she spoke to him softly, tears falling in a steady stream down her face. Quentin met her gaze as she spoke, but his eyes seemed very far away, face pale and drawn, the slump of his shoulders telling the tale of his exhaustion.

Alice sat at the dining table with Margo, the two of them sipping coffee and wearing twin masks of fatigue. Eliot went to the kitchen, poured himself a cup, and joined them.

“How is he?” he asked.

“He’s… quiet,” Alice said. “Hasn’t really said much of anything since last night.”

Eliot sipped his coffee and made a face, casting a tiny spell over his mug to chase away the bitter. “You just have to—”

“Give it time. I know.” Alice fixed her gaze over his shoulder, in the direction of the living room.

Eliot looked to Margo. “I’m going to Fillory. Is Twenty-Three around?”

“Nope,” she said, eyes trained down on her mug. “Guess you’ll just have to stay here.”

“Don’t be ridiculous. I’ll go to Brakebills, take the clock. I assume that thing works again now that magic is back on full-blast.” 

Margo didn’t respond. Everyone looked uncomfortable and tired.

Eliot made them breakfast, serving Quentin’s to him on the sofa and watching from the kitchen as he ate it slowly. Margo still wouldn’t look at him but it didn’t matter. He would make her see.

He slipped out of the penthouse quietly and went to Brakebills alone. Eliot stepped through the grandfather clock in the Physical Kids’ Cottage and into the deep shaft of light on the other end, and then the dark, following it down until he found the light again, the hot afternoon sun of Fillory greeting him like an old friend.

—

Fen studied Eliot carefully. “There’s something different about you,” she said, her expression twisting into a mask of uncertainty. “Did you change your hair?”

“No.” Eliot sighed. “Look, I’m just gonna make this easy and spare you the bullshit. You need to unbanish Margo so she can come back home.”

Fen pursed her lips and cocked her head. “I don’t think that I can just do that, Eliot.”

“You’re High King,” Eliot reminded her, eyeing his old crown on her head. “You can do whatever the fuck you want.”

She considered this for a moment. Eliot could see the silent conversation she was spinning with herself behind her eyes. “It’s… a whole thing, though. With the branding of the sigils and... I mean, how would that make me look if I up and unbanished the former High King I just overthrew?”

Eliot straightened his back, closing the distance between them slowly. “You overthrew her because she asked you to. Because it was the only way that she could save me.”

“I overthrew her because it was my destiny.”

Eliot laughed and turned away, making his way over to her throne. The throne that used to be Margo’s. The throne that used to be his. “Destiny… is bullshit.” He ran a finger across the throne’s gilded arm, up along the back, circling it slowly. “But if it weren’t… I’m the only one here who took a blood test.”

Fen physically recoiled at that. “You don’t mean—”

He circled his way back to her with an easy smile. “God, no. Don’t be ridiculous. I was a shitty king on my best days. And even after I was out of that ludicrous marriage contract I—” She gaped at him, genuinely looking hurt. “What? You didn’t actually enjoy being married to someone who could barely get it up for you.”

She took a step back, crossing her arms over her chest. “I tried my best to make you happy.”

A dozen terrible things wheeled through Eliot’s mind, but he only smirked and said, “This isn’t what I came here for.”

She frowned. “The West Lorians would kill her if I let her back in now. They only let her leave with her head because I agreed to banishment. That means forever, Eliot.”

Eliot spit out a laugh. “The West Lorians aren’t going to do shit. And if they try, you have an army.”

“We’ve finally forged a peace with them, Eliot, I can’t risk that for—”

He crowded into her personal space. “You can. And you will. You would be nothing without me, and without Margo. And I don’t want you to ever forget that.”

Eliot recognized the look in her eyes. It was the look of animals when they see the shadow looming overhead, when they sense the oncoming storm in their bones. “I’d have to… talk to my council.”

“You mean Tick.”

“I mean…” She began backing away slowly. “You’re scaring me, Eliot.”

“Why would you be scared of me?”

The guards near the door had begun moving in, but Fen sent them back with a wave of her hand. “Because something’s different. Something in your eyes…”

“I’m better than I’ve ever been.” Eliot shrugged, a smile spreading itself over his face. “Talk to your… council. Do whatever the fuck you have to. But I’m not leaving here until I know the next time I walk through that portal, Margo will be with me.”

She said nothing, only nodded with terror in her eyes as Eliot turned his back, leaving her there to tremble in her crown. He smiled at the guards that used to be his as he made his way down one long corridor after the next, his footfalls echoing like distant music. Eliot walked with purpose, not stopping even when Rafe called after him when their paths crossed near the library.

“Eliot! You look... better!”

“I’m fucking phenomenal, Rafe!” he shouted over his shoulder, Rafe’s response swallowed up by cold stone as he turned a corner.

Two guards stopped him outside of Tick’s personal living quarters, the one that Eliot knew by name stepping forward. “You can’t go in there.”

“Favian.” Eliot stared him down. “I was good to you when I was king.”

Favian looked over to his partner, a pale, broad-faced man who kept his eyes trained forward. “Is there… a reason you’d like to request an audience with—”

Eliot spit out a laugh. “Request an audience? Please. Just tell Tick that I’m here. And you can get back to your important business of holding up the wall.”

Favian narrowed his eyes. “There’s something different about you.”

Eliot sighed, his mind a blissful void of determination, glaring until Favian relented, turning on his heels and pushing open the heavy door, leaving Eliot to wait in the shadows. A moment later he returned, and Eliot was ushered inside.

Tick sat at his writing desk with his back to the door, the east-facing window before him overlooking the placid bay. “I’ll be with you in just a moment.”

Eliot glared at the back of his head. “Did Favian not—”

“He did.” Tick’s voice dripped in that condescending way that made Eliot’s skin crawl, and his pen kept moving for a handful of seconds longer before going still. He pushed back from the desk and stood, turning to Eliot with a tense smile. “How may I help you?”

Eliot closed the gap between them in a few quick strides. “High King Fen is going to be paying you a visit,” he said.

“All right.” Tick blinked at him slowly. “And why does High King Fen need Former High King Eliot to warn me of her impending visit?”

Eliot laughed, unable to keep the annoyance from his voice. “Because Former High King Eliot needs Current High Council Leader Tick to give very specific advice to High King Fen when she comes to seek his counsel.”

Tick cocked his head, a smug grin stretched across his insufferable face. “And why would I do that?”

Eliot breathed in deep and, jesus, had he always wanted to punch his face this badly? “Because if you don’t…” He stepped closer, forcing Tick back against the edge of his desk. “Things are going to become… difficult. For you.”

Tick gave him a puzzled look, more amused than worried. “Eliot, are you… threatening me?”

Eliot smirked. “No. I’m simply making a statement of fact.”

Tick squinted. “You’re different.”

“Yeah, well, I was a total fucking mess the last time—”

“No.” That smile again. Eliot fought the urge to smack it away. “That’s not how I mean it.”

“It doesn’t matter.” Eliot took a step back, for his own sake more than Tick’s. “What does matter is that Fen is going to seek counsel on unbanishing Margo. And you’re going to tell her that she should do it. That she has to.”

A high laugh rang out from Tick’s grinning mouth. “You’re not serious.”

“Look at my face. I didn’t come here to play games. You’re going to tell her—”

“And why would I do that?”

“Because Margo is the only reason your head isn’t rotting on a pike outside the castle walls.” Eliot narrowed his eyes, his heart beating calmly, evenly. Eliot was utterly in control. “She saved you. You literally owe her your life.” He pressed in closer again, bringing his face very close to Tick’s. “And if you value the life that you still have because of Margo’s mercy, you will tell High King Fen to unbanish her. You will tell her it is for the good of all of Fillory. Do you understand?”

Tick’s throat worked as he swallowed, the cracks in his mask of indifference starting to show. “I… will consider—”

“No. You won’t.” Eliot took a few easy breaths, not breaking his gaze even for a second. “You will tell her. Let me hear you say it.”

Tick studied him intensely, pressing himself back against his desk as far as he could go. “I… will tell her.”

Eliot stepped back with a smile. “Good.”

Tick just stood there blinking and blank-faced, but when he let his eyes scan down, Eliot could see that his hands were shaking. Pleased, he turned his back and headed for the door.

Halfway down the long, silent corridor, Eliot was seized by a hand on his shoulder. He turned to see Favian standing there, fidgeting in his heavy uniform.

“If you have a moment,” he said, “can we maybe talk somewhere… more private?”

Eliot looked up and down the hall. “Is this not private enough for you?”

Favian shot a glance back at his partner, standing stoically to one side of Tick’s door, looking back to Eliot and raising his brows. 

Eliot gave him a dark smile. “I see. Follow me.”

They went to Eliot’s room and shut the door. Eliot sat on the edge of the bed, watching as Favian pulled off his ridiculous cap and crushed it in his hands. 

“So I was thinking. What you said… it’s true. You were always good to me when you were king.”

Eliot studied him curiously, the way his usually stoic face now twitched with emotion, the way his fingers struggled to pull his hair out of the neat ponytail that held it at his nape. He shook it out and let it fall around his shoulders, golden in the light of the spells that kept the room alight.

“You were always good to me. And I always…” He took one step closer, and then another, tossing his cap down to the floor. “I always wanted to thank you.”

Eliot smiled up at him, delighted and amused. “You want… to thank me.”

“Yes.” The word came out all air, and he lowered himself to kneel at Eliot’s feet, running one tentative hand up the curve of his knee. “If you’ll allow me…”

Eliot laughed softly. “Are you asking if you can suck my dick, Favian?”

Favian blushed high on his cheeks. “I always wanted… I couldn’t…”

“You couldn’t service your High King?”

“You were married…”

“That contract was void while I still had the crown.” Eliot smirked, watching as his hand crept higher, a pleasant warmth seeping through the fabric of his pants. “So why wait?”

Favian’s hand trembled against Eliot’s thigh. “I don’t know. I guess I was… intimidated.”

Eliot grinned. “But you’re not intimated now?”

Favian shook his head, his blush only deepening. “I am. I just… guess I’m braver.”

Braver. The word slipped under Eliot’s skin and set something going in his veins. Something warm and bright. His hand moved higher still, curving into the space where Eliot’s thigh met his groin. Eliot was growing hard, and as Favian’s hand hovered just over the bulge at the front of his slacks he knew that he had nothing to lose. An eager mouth on his dick was just what he needed to wash away the annoyance of his little encounter with Tick. So when he seized Favian’s wrist and spit out, “Wait,” followed by, “I can’t,” he could hardly believe the words had come from his own mouth.

Favian snatched his wrist away, huffing out a nervous laugh. “I don’t understand.”

“Yeah,” Eliot said, rising to his feet and smoothing his hands down the front of his vest. “Neither do I.” He thought of Quentin’s sweater hanging in his closet, another action that didn’t quite make sense. “You should… get back to your post. I don’t think Tick will be very pleased to find you’ve abandoned your duties.”

Eliot stepped past Favian as he sputtered out a response, leaving him there on his knees, blushing and no doubt feeling foolish. He stopped by the throne room before leaving the castle, finding it empty save for a handful of guards standing stone-faced along one wall. 

“Where is High King Fen?” Eliot asked.

“High King Fen has just called a meeting of the High Council,” one of the guards replied.

Eliot smiled. “Very good,” he said, heading for the door.

—

Eliot stepped through the portal tree and out through the clock. Professor Sunderland gave him an incredulous look when he went to her office asking for another portal back to the city, but agreed to do it anyway. 

The first words out of Margo’s mouth when he walked through the door of the penthouse were, “Eliot, what the fuck did you do now?”

She held her wrists up to him, perfectly unscarred. 

“I did exactly what I said I was going to.” He pressed a kiss to her forehead. “You’re welcome.”

“And how in the high holy fuck did you manage that?”

Eliot shrugged. “I asked nicely.”

She glared. “Bull. Tell me.”

“I’m incredibly charming, Bambi. Or have you forgotten? Don’t worry.” He laughed. “Nobody lost their head. And now we can go back home. Together.”

She followed him over to the sofa, sitting down beside him at a distance. “Coldwater’s getting worse,” she said.

“How do you mean?”

“A while after you left he… I don’t know. Went catatonic, but then he started making these sounds. Like a wounded animal. Alice took him to bed but he won’t talk to anyone.”

He glanced over at the door to the master suite. “She in there with him now?”

“Yep.”

“He’ll be all right.”

“You need to go to him.”

Eliot sighed. “There’s nothing I can do for him now.”

“El, if you don’t get your ass in that room…”

She gave him a hard look, one that Eliot knew well, and though it didn’t make him feel anything at all the way it used to, he decided that he’d rather not argue. He left her there and went to the door, knocking gently and waiting for a handful of seconds before going inside.

Alice sat in a chair by the bed, looking startled when Eliot entered, but softening as he shut the door. Quentin lay on the bed over the covers, knees tucked up to his chest with his back to her.

“How is he?” he asked.

She frowned. “How does he look to you?”

“Like someone who was shattered.” He traced the curve of Quentin’s body with his eyes. “Why did you bring him to my room?”

“Because it’s the biggest,” she said flatly. “And it’s not your room.”

Eliot perched on the edge of the mattress. “My clothes are in the closet,” he said, eyes still fixed on Quentin.

“Do you seriously want to argue about this right now?”

“No. I don’t want to argue,” he said, raising his eyes to her. “Can I have a minute alone with him?”

Her gaze flicked between the two of them, looking sad and tired. Without a word she got up and went to the door, shutting it quietly behind her. Eliot went to the chair at sat, gazing at the curve of Quentin’s back in the lamplight.

“I don’t… know if you can hear me.” His voice felt suddenly too big for the room. “But… I’m here. If that makes any difference.” He laughed to himself. “I don’t know what I can possibly do for you now. Not that I could do anything for you… before. Well,” he laughed again, softer this time, “I could have, but I fucked that all up, didn’t I?”

Quentin shifted on the bed, and Eliot froze, watching him stretch out his limbs and roll onto his back, his eyes fluttering open just a crack as he turned his face to him. “You’re here,” he croaked, and Eliot gave him the tiniest of smiles.

“I’m here.”

“Where’d you go?”

“Fillory.”

“Oh.”

A silence stretched between them. Eliot could have said anything to Quentin and it wouldn’t have mattered. The Eliot who had loved him was gone, shattered in a compact mirror tucked away in a stash box on his dresser. In between a bottle of pills and a pack of rolling papers.

And he didn’t have to stay, but he did, leaning back in the chair with a sigh. “How are you feeling?” he asked.

Quentin groaned. “Not entirely human.”

“I know the feeling,” Eliot said, and Quentin peeked at him out of one tired eye.

“You mean…” Quentin’s words came very slowly. “When the Monster…”

_No _, Eliot thought. “Something like that, yeah,” Eliot said.__

__The Eliot who had loved him had dreamed of this day. He’d dreamed of it every night for weeks on end. Quentin alive, Quentin in his bed. Quentin’s eyes and his mouth and his hands. The things that they would do, not just with their bodies but with their words. The Eliot who had loved him had promised to be brave._ _

__But now, he supposed there wasn’t any point. He shifted in the chair and asked, “Have any more memories come back?”_ _

__Quentin took a few unsteady breaths. “No. Well… a few. But they’re all in… pieces.”_ _

__Fuck it. Eliot couldn’t help himself. “Do you remember the mosaic?”_ _

__Quentin blinked. “What’s the mosaic?”_ _

__Eliot thought he might have felt something then, briefly, just a flash, the memory of the thing more than the ache, but before he could give it a name it had gone. “It’s not important,” he said, gesturing to the bottle of water on the nightstand. “You should drink that.”_ _

__Quentin’s tired eyes fluttered. “I’d rather you read to me again.”_ _

__“Did it help? With the memories, I mean.”_ _

__“I don’t know.” Quentin sighed. “But I liked it.”_ _

__Eliot nodded, took out his phone, and with a few clicks had _The Girl Who Told Time_ pulled up on the screen._ _

__Quentin asked, “Will you sit next to me?” and Eliot lifted his eyes._ _

__“I am sitting next to you.”_ _

__“Like… before.”_ _

__Eliot let his eyes fall back to the screen, the words before him all blurring together. “I don’t think before was a very good idea.”_ _

__“Why? I thought we were friends.”_ _

__“We were. We... are.”_ _

__Quentin rolled onto his side, his body curving toward Eliot in the chair. “There’s something you’re not telling me.”_ _

__“No,” Eliot said firmly, lifting his eyes to him. “There are just a lot of things you don’t remember.”_ _

__Quentin said nothing after that, and Eliot began to read. _The Girl Who Told Time_ was a glorified retelling of _The World in the Walls,_ written to fill in plot-holes and make money. It was a dull and lifeless imitation of the real Fillory, all of Plover’s books were, plagiarism at its worst and without any teeth, but there were moments—secretly—that Eliot would always have a fondness for._ _

__In the first book, Rupert’s leg that had been wounded in the war is magically healed. In _The Girl Who Told Time,_ it’s revealed that he’d done so by visiting a torrent and simply stepping inside. The real Chatwin’s Torrent doesn’t work that way—there’s a price to pay for everything in the real Fillory—but in the book it’s nothing short of a miracle. _ _

__Rupert Chatwin, wounded and scarred, was healed from his leg to his soul. Made perfect, cured of every ache._ _

__Eliot could feel Quentin’s eyes on him as he read. “How about you drink that water now,” he said, pausing and reaching for the bottle._ _

__Quentin sighed, but didn’t protest when Eliot screwed off the cap and handed it over. He propped himself up, took a few sips, and handed it back. “You seem different,” he said._ _

__Eliot laughed softly. “How would you know how I seem? You can’t remember—”_ _

__“I remember enough.”_ _

__Their eyes met in the dim glow of the lamplight, every memory that Quentin couldn’t remember winding between them like so many unspoken words. Eliot swallowed them down and pulled his body from the chair. “I’ll go get Alice,” he said. “You should get some more rest.”_ _

__“Thank you for reading to me,” Quentin said, sounding broken, and Eliot turned away._ _

__—_ _

__Eliot didn’t see Quentin for three more days. He stayed tucked away behind the door of the master suite, sleeping and taking his meals in bed. The one time Eliot ventured inside to move some of his things to one of the smaller rooms upstairs, only the top of Quentin’s head was visible from under the covers, the rise and fall of his shoulders steady as he dreamed._ _

__Margo wouldn’t go with him to Fillory. “I don’t know what you’re capable of,” she said over breakfast._ _

__“The same things I was capable of before, Bambi,” Eliot said. “Only far less maudlin blah. We’ll have so much fun together. Remember when we used to have fun?”_ _

__“The Eliot I had fun with was capable of loving me back.”_ _

__Eliot didn’t let it faze him. That night he and Alice sat out on the balcony watching Manhattan light pollution wash out the stars as he chain smoked cigarettes and she eyed him sadly._ _

__“He’s been asking about you,” she said, and Eliot crushed his cigarette in the ashtray balanced on his knee._ _

__“Then maybe he should get out of bed.”_ _

__“He’s trying. He’s remembering more things. He remembered…” She paused, watching him spark a flame to life at the tips of his fingers. “He remembered that we were together before… before he—”_ _

__“I don’t know why you’re telling me this.”_ _

__“Because you’re supposed to be our friend,” she spit, the set of her shoulders tense, eyes sparking in the dim light. “I told him I… didn’t think it could be like it was before. I’m… different. And still really pissed off.”_ _

__Eliot puffed on his cigarette, watching her watching him. “I think I’ll go to Fillory alone,” he said._ _

__“Do whatever you want,” she said. “But I think you should know… I was looking at your shade. I found it in your little box.”_ _

__“So?”_ _

__“I really looked at it this time, and I... I think maybe it can be mended. By someone who knows how.”_ _

__Eliot shrugged. “Why should I care?”_ _

__“Because you need it.” Her voice was all sharp edges. Eliot offered her a cigarette and she brushed him off. “You think you don’t want to feel things but that’s only because—”_ _

__“Do you remember… when Quentin brought you back from being a niffin.” He inhaled deeply and blew a smoke ring into the night. “Do you remember how you felt? Because I do.”_ _

__“You have no idea how I felt.”_ _

__“I know that you were angry. You resented him for taking that away from you. Probably still do.” Eliot watched a star twinkle through the haze. “You’d found it, the answer to everything. And there was no more pain.”_ _

__“You’re right,” she said after a long silence, her voice fitting smoothly into the dark. “But I wouldn’t choose that again. I could go back to that if I wanted to, it would be so easy… but I don’t want to be a monster anymore.”_ _

__“I’m not a monster,” Eliot said._ _

__“No, but you will be if you keep this up.”_ _

__He crushed his cigarette in the ashtray and set it aside. “I won’t go back to feeling that way. I’ll go back to Fillory, everyone will be better off.”_ _

__She frowned as Eliot pulled himself up out of his chair. “You’re a real selfish prick, you know that?”_ _

__“Yeah, I know,” he said, turning his back to the night._ _

__Quentin was sitting on the spiral staircase when Eliot went inside. “I remembered something,” he said, and Eliot could only blink, waiting for him to continue. “The day we met. You were the first person… at Brakebills…”_ _

__“Yeah,” Eliot said, fidgeting with his pack of cigarettes. “I was.”_ _

__“It’s a nice memory.” Quentin stared down into the glass clutched tightly in his hands. “I have a lot of nice memories of you.” When Eliot didn’t respond, Quentin raised his eyes, “Why are you different?”_ _

__Eliot crushed his cigarettes in a tight fist. “Because I am.”_ _

__“You would tell me if… there was something I could do to help.”_ _

__Unable to bear the look in his eyes, Eliot averted his gaze. “Just focus on getting better, okay?”_ _

__“Okay,” Quentin said, softly, uncertainly, and Eliot slipped past him quickly, winding his way up the stairs to his room._ _

__—_ _

__Eliot didn’t go back to Fillory. He stayed in the penthouse and counted the days. The worst part of it all was that he didn’t understand what he was doing, what he was counting to, why he was waiting. Quentin got a little better each day, though he flinched away from everyone’s touch. Everyone’s except for Eliot’s, because Eliot decidedly didn’t touch him._ _

__A week passed. Quentin said, “I remembered the mosaic,” and Eliot’s heart squeezed itself into a tight fist in his chest._ _

__He looked at Quentin over his steaming mug of coffee. “You did?”_ _

__“Yeah. In _The Flying Forest._ Jane goes to the mosaic, but someone’s already finished it.” Quentin squinted at him. “It’s not a very important part of the book. Why would you ask me if I remembered that? I, well, okay...” His hands swirled in the air, as they were wont to do when he was about to go on a tangent, and for a moment it was as though he’d never shattered at all. “There was always a debate about whether it was a plot hole or not, it uh… it doesn’t really fit with the rest of the story and—why are you looking at me like that?”_ _

__Eliot shook his head, reminding himself to breathe. “Nothing. Go on. Tell me about the plot hole.”_ _

__—_ _

__By his count, it had been two weeks since the night they’d put Quentin back together, and Eliot was starting to grow restless. Cooped up in the penthouse spinning his wheels and chain smoking, he no longer had any idea what he was actually doing. He could go anywhere, he could do anything._ _

__“Thought you were going to Fillory,” Alice said, looking up from her reading._ _

__Eliot stuck out his chin with a smile. “Hoping to make a grand entrance for my return. All good things in time.”_ _

__She eyed him incredulously and went back to her book. Eliot groped at the empty cigarette pack in his pocket with a groan, scouring the penthouse and coming up empty in every room. When finally he found himself with no other choice, Eliot went to the master suite and slipped inside, quietly, not wishing to disturb Quentin’s rest_ _

__But Quentin wasn’t in bed. He was standing at the dresser, the box on top flipped open, the shattered compact mirror that had been inside now fluttering in his hands._ _

__“Q…”_ _

__Quentin turned to him with a frown. “This is your…”_ _

__“You should… just put it back where you found it, okay? I’m just looking for a cigarette and—”_ _

__“It makes sense now.” Quentin fixed his eyes on the strobing light in the shattered glass. “When I was, uh… in there. The thing that… called to me. I remember now. It looked like you only… a child.” When Quentin raised his eyes they were damp. “It was your shade, wasn’t it?”_ _

__Eliot’s heart began to pound, well and truly, for perhaps the first time in two long weeks. “It doesn’t matter, just—”_ _

__“Eliot.” Oh. The way Quentin’s voice trembled turned Eliot’s knees to water. “What did you do?”_ _

__Eliot breathed in deeply, let it out, crossed the space between them and snatched the compact from Quentin’s hand. “I did what I had to,” he said, jaw clenched tight as he tossed it back into the box and shut the lid._ _

__“You have to put it back in, Eliot, you have to… you can’t just—”_ _

__“Can’t put it back.” Eliot’s voice was small and thin. “It’s broken.”_ _

__Quentin sat down on the foot of the bed, his eyes going wide and unfocused. “Do you know what happens… do you remember…” He shook his head, emotion choking off his voice. “The Beast. Julia. What happened to me in timeline twenty-three. You’ll be… a monster.”_ _

__“I’m not a monster, don’t plan on turning into one either.” Eliot let his eyes settle on a space beyond where Quentin was sitting, anywhere but his face. “I’m better off without it.”_ _

__“You’re—” Quentin let out an incredulous laugh, throwing his hands in the air. “Were you ever going to tell me?”_ _

__“I don’t know why you care.” Eliot half-turned his body to the door, overcome with the urge to hide, to run away. “You don’t even remember…”_ _

__“I don’t know what I don’t remember.” Quentin’s voice quavered. “But I know that we’re friends and that you—”_ _

__“Just… rest, okay. You just need to rest.”_ _

__Quentin said something in response, but Eliot didn’t hear it, blood pounding out a furious rhythm in his ears as he slipped out of the room._ _

__—_ _

__A day passed and then another. Eliot tried to reason with himself, ticking off a list in his head of all the possible reasons he still hadn’t left for Fillory:_ _

__One, Margo wouldn’t go._ _

__Two, Fen and Tick were probably pissed, best to give it time._ _

__Three, generally speaking, the men are prettier on Earth._ _

__His reasons to go were seemingly endless: there was no one who needed him on Earth, he was losing his mind being cooped up in the penthouse, he could really use a warm mouth on his dick, he could skip Fillory all together and go to The Neitherlands, escape into a hundred worlds, do anything his heart desired._ _

__He found Alice in the study and watched her from the doorway. “I think I’m going to leave today. Find a world somewhere that’s nothing like Earth or Fillory.”_ _

__“No you’re not” she said, not looking up from the page she was scribbling on. “What do you want, Eliot?”_ _

__“Has he… remembered anything else?”_ _

__“Why do you care? You don’t feel anything for anyone anymore.”_ _

__Eliot leaned on the doorway and sighed. “Alice. Please.”_ _

__She was quiet. Eliot looked to the clock on the wall and watched as it ticked thirty seconds away. “You should go to him if you want to know how he’s doing,” she said finally._ _

__Eliot stepped into the room, peering at the notebook page half-filled with Alice’s intricate spell work on the desk. “What are you working on?”_ _

__“I doesn’t matter.” Her pen stilled as she turned to him. “The way I see it, Eliot, you have two options. You can either get on with it and leave like you’ve been saying you’re going to for weeks, or you can try to actually do something to fix this impossible fucking situation.”_ _

__Alice went back to her writing, and Eliot watched her for a moment, the gentle motion of her delicate shoulders as her pen worked, the soft rustling of her hair as she turned to consult the thick tome she had cracked open on the desk._ _

__With nothing more to say, Eliot backed out of the room. He found Quentin out on the balcony, puffing away on a lopsided joint that he’d clearly rolled himself._ _

__“You sure that’s a good idea?” he asked, stepping out into the morning sun._ _

__“I… remembered…” Quentin’s hand trembled as he brought the joint to his lips, took a hit, let it out. “I remembered.”_ _

__Eliot clenched his hands into fists. “What did you remember?”_ _

__“I went in your box. Looking for this.” He gestured to the joint burning away between his fingers. “And I, uh… touched the mirror. Your shade. I couldn’t help myself and it… I touched it and—and I, um…”_ _

__Quentin took another hit, his eyes red-rimmed and damp. Eliot slowly lowered himself down in the chair next to him, waiting for him to continue._ _

__“It all hit me so fast. I… it wasn’t just one memory. It was hundreds… thousands. Years… years of, uh…” Quentin blinked away a thick swell of tears. “How is that possible, El?”_ _

__Eliot suddenly felt smaller, as though he might be shrinking. “I don’t know, Q.” He swallowed, took the offered joint from Quentin’s hand, took a hit. “Do you remember… remembering before?_ _

__Quentin’s brows knitted together. “There’s a lot of blank space still. Did we remember right away? Did we… how did we get back?”_ _

__Eliot reached for the ashtray, stubbing out the joint, studying Quentin’s face carefully. He was beautiful, even in his agony. “Margo stopped it,” he said after a moment. “It didn’t happen but… it happened. Somewhere. And we… remembered. Not long after.”_ _

__Quentin stared blankly into the hazy morning light. “We had a family.”_ _

__“Yes.”_ _

__Quentin wiped at his eyes. “How did you feel when you remembered all of this?”_ _

__Eliot took a breath. He could be braver now. He was. Now that the pesky heart of him had been plucked away. “Like I was so in love with you that it was going to kill me.”_ _

__“Yeah…” Quentin worried his hands in his lap, hair falling down into his eyes. “You don’t feel that way now though.”_ _

__“I can’t. I’m…”_ _

__The tears were back in full force now. Quentin laughed, and it was a terrible sound. “This is so fucked up, Eliot.”_ _

__The emptiness at Eliot’s center seemed to pulse, swallowing up the light. He could feel it, almost, he thought, maybe for a second or two before it fluttered away. All he could think to say was, “I know.”_ _

__“What am I supposed to do now?” Quentin asked, voice breaking in a way that made Eliot’s blood run cold._ _

__“I don’t know, Q,” he said, turning his body away. “I’m sorry.”_ _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay so the end of this chapter is super mean and I'M SORRY but... I think most of you will find that the remaining three chapters more than make up for it. Or at least I hope you do. Thank you for all the lovely comments so far, and for sticking with me through all this pain. <3


	5. Mend

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> That night, Eliot couldn’t sleep. He sat in the kitchen sipping whisky and forming little storm clouds between his fingers, feeling drained of every purpose but the rote mechanics of lifeless magic. Think a spell, form a spell, watch it die away.

That night, Eliot couldn’t sleep. He sat in the kitchen sipping whisky and forming little storm clouds between his fingers, feeling drained of every purpose but the rote mechanics of lifeless magic. Think a spell, form a spell, watch it die away.

Alice’s footfalls winding down the staircase announced her arrival, and Eliot tensed at the sound. An open notebook landed in front of him on the counter a moment later. “I can’t do it,” she said, and Eliot frowned at the pages, their sigils and equations all running together before his eyes. 

“I don’t know what this is.”

“I thought I might be able to mend your shade.”

Eliot scowled down into his glass. How was she not getting that he just wanted to be left alone? “I never asked you to do that.”

“Yeah, well, everything is a raging trash fire right now, Eliot, so I really don’t care what you asked me to do.”

He downed the last of his drink, set down his glass, sent the notebook across the room with a flick of his wrist. “I don’t want it.”

“It’s too intricate, even for me,” she said, like he hadn’t just sent her spell work hurtling through the air. “Maybe a healer could do it, someone with the right discipline…”

“Minor mending.” The words slurred out of Eliot’s mouth before he had time to register what he was even saying, suddenly much drunker than he’d been a second ago.

“I don’t know if that would be enough. A shade isn’t a small object it’s…” She pulled a face, thinking it over. “I don’t think Quentin is well enough to do magic on that level right now. But maybe—”

“No,” Eliot said firmly, meeting the intensity of her eyes, daring her to continue. “I said I don’t want it. You need to let it go.”

He could see the venom she was aching to spit, and deep in his bones Eliot wished that she would. But she only turned away from him, snatching the notebook off the floor before winding her way back up the staircase, leaving Eliot to his sulking, his tiny storm clouds, his empty glass.

—

Quentin lay curled up on the sofa, thumbing at his phone screen. Eliot said, “I need to tell you something.”

Quentin raised his red-rimmed eyes, his face drawn, looking more exhausted than Eliot had ever seen him. “What is it?”

“It might make… this whole thing worse.” Eliot thought he might have felt something then, not nerves exactly but something related. Like he had to force the words to move from his brain to his tongue. “But you deserve to know. Just in case you… never remember.”

Quentin tossed his phone down on the coffee table and got himself upright. “Okay.”

Eliot sat on the far end of the sofa. He didn’t have to say any of this, didn’t have to let it matter, but the horrible truth of it all was that he wanted to. “When we remembered the mosaic, you…” He took a breath. “You told me that you wanted us to be together. In this life. And because I was a coward, I pushed you away. I said you wouldn’t choose me, and I wouldn’t choose you… but I need you to know that I was only running because I was afraid. And that everything you said was true. Even if you can’t remember. Even if… it doesn’t matter now.”

“Oh…” Quentin’s expression was impossible to read. He just looked so fucking tired. “Thank you. For telling me.”

“You’re welcome. I’m sorry I was an idiot.” Eliot forced a laugh. “But you see now why… it’s better. The way that I am now.”

Quentin shook his head. “It’s not better. It’s really fucking not, Eliot.”

“You should…” Eliot’s pulse picked up a little. “Try to work things out with Alice.”

Eliot regretted the words the moment they left his mouth. Quentin’s expression twisted with a thousand terrible emotions, and he turned his body away. “Fuck you, Eliot,” he said quietly, curling in on himself a little more by the second.

If shame were an emotion, Eliot felt it in the hollows of every bone, deeper than the spaces where his magic sprang to life. Chest tight and heart pounding, he pulled himself to his feet and all but ran to the door. He’d intended to go down to the street, weave himself in and out of crowds of chattering tourists and dodge traffic near Central Park until his legs gave out. Instead, he collapsed just outside the door, slumping against the wall and tucking his knees tightly to his chest.

Eliot could go anywhere, do anything, be anyone that he pleased, reinvent himself a hundred times as he traipsed around the multiverse. He had the magic and the means, yet there he sat, rocking himself like a child on the cold and unforgiving floor of a New York City high-rise.

An hour passed, maybe more. Across the hall, the elevator dinged, and Julia stepped out.

She dropped the heavy tote she’d been carrying near his feet with a thud. “Everything okay?”

“Fine,” he said, stretching out his legs straightening his back. “Just needed some air.”

She gave him a curious look and slumped down beside him, knocking her head back against the wall. “Q told me what you did.”

Eliot sighed. “Of course he did.”

When he looked to her, she was smirking. “I mean, don’t get me wrong I… don’t really blame you. Alice said it was probably the only way—”

“Jesus, is that all you people do is gossip?”

“Guess so. But that doesn’t change the fact that you’re an idiot for not wanting it back.”

Eliot nodded slowly. “This is very helpful, thank you.”

“Look. I’m probably the only person you’re ever going to meet who’s been exactly where you are right now.”

Eliot met her eyes. “Yeah, well, even if I did want it back… it’s broken, so…”

“So, we’re magicians. Fixing broken shit is sort of what we do.”

Eliot laughed. “Since when have we ever tried to fix something and not had it blow back in our faces even worse than when we started?”

“Well, we fix what we can.” She nudged him with her shoulder. “And when we break shit we get back up and try again.”

“I don’t want—”

“To feel all the terrible shit that make you human? I know.” She shrugged. “But just because you don’t have a shade doesn’t mean you aren’t still feeling. Like right now… you’re terrified.”

Eliot bit at the inside of his lip, hard. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

She huffed out a laugh. “I don’t? Okay. Whatever you need to tell yourself. But you can’t keep running from it forever. Whatever you’re afraid of… it’s going to catch up with you eventually. Not being able to really feel it doesn’t make it go away.”

They sat in silence after that for a long time, but eventually Julia pulled herself to her feet. “I’m making dinner if you’re hungry,” she said, plucking up her tote and disappearing behind the penthouse door.

Eliot stayed in the hall until the sun began to die away somewhere beyond the horizon. Weak-kneed and wobbly, he got up and went inside. Making a beeline for the staircase, he dragged his aching bones up to his room and fell down into his bed, wishing for the sweet release of unconsciousness, if only for a little while.

—

Eliot dreamed in stolen fragments, snatches of light and sound, waking before dawn covered in sweat and sticking to his sheets. He did a cleaning spell on the bed and hopped into the shower, dressing again in yesterday’s clothes and stumbling down the stairs.

Alice was sipping coffee in the kitchen. He looked at her across the counter and asked, “What if I can’t do magic anymore?”

She didn’t look at him, and her expression didn’t change. “What made you change your mind?” she asked.

“I haven’t. I’m just…” He sighed, leaning his weight against the counter. “I’m thinking… about everything.”

“I guess you have to ask yourself what your magic is worth. If it’s the most important thing in your life.” She sipped her coffee slowly. “Whatever you said to him yesterday must have been pretty fucked up. He’s gone quiet again, won’t get out of bed, refused to come out for dinner last night.”

Eliot avoided her eyes and made his coffee, feeling the full weight of the empty hole he’d had carved out inside himself. He sat down on the sofa with his mug, holding the steam rising from inside closely to his face and letting it warm him. He shot the coffee back slowly, coming away just as cold and confused as when he began, his thoughts racing too quickly to latch onto any one long enough to make sense of it.

He went to the bedroom and pressed his ear to the door, listening to the silence droning on the other side before pushing it open. Quentin was curled up in the bed, the covers pulled all the way up over his ears. It had become a familiar sight. Eliot clicked the door shut behind him. “I know you’re not sleeping,” he said, and from under his nest of blankets Quentin sighed.

Eliot went to the bed and sat on the edge, near the curve of Quentin’s knees. “You don’t have to say anything if you don’t want to, but I just wanted to say… that I’m a fucking idiot, Q.”

Silence then. Neither of them moved. Eliot pressed his palm flat against the bed, nearer to the comma of Quentin’s body under the mound of blankets. He counted his own breaths, one, two…

Slowly, the covers over Quentin’s face lowered, his hooded eyes meeting Eliot’s in the semi-dark. “I don’t need you to tell me that you’re an idiot,” he mumbled. “I already know.”

Eliot shot him a smile that quickly faded. “I owe you an apology, Q. A real one. You deserve… so much more than I could ever give you. Even before I—”

“Stop,” Quentin said through gritted teeth, rolling onto his back, running his fingers through his hair, eyes fixed firmly on the ceiling. “You’re doing it again.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Then fucking act like it, Eliot.”

“I’m… sorry.” He frowned, fidgeting where he sat, his skin suddenly prickling and hot all over. Eliot didn’t know if he wanted to fight or flee or crawl under the bed. “I’ll go if you want me to.”

“I don’t want you to go.” Quentin’s words were as tense as the line of his body. “I want you to stop telling me how I feel. I want…” He took a breath and pushed it out. “I want… you. Jesus fuck, Eliot. I want you. And—and you said that I told you this before and… that you were in love with me.”

“I was.”

Quentin sat up, leaning forward, his hair wild and his eyes growing damp. “Then do something different this time. Because I’m…” He cast his eyes downward into his lap, voice going all quiet and soft. “I’m pretty sure that you’re the love of my life.” Quentin breathed. Eliot watched him with a phantom ache in the hollow of his chest. “And I don’t know,” he continued after a moment, gently, “what I’m going to do if I have to do this alone.”

“You’re not alone, Q.”

Quentin lifted his eyes to Eliot’s face. “I am if you can’t love me back.”

There was something gnawing at Eliot then, something emptier than the blank spot stretched across his soul. Something he hadn’t allowed himself to think about for weeks. “I have to ask you something,” he said, “and I need you to be honest.”

Quentin gave him a tired nod, saying nothing.

“Do you remember when you… did what you did in the Mirror World?”

“It happened so fast. I…” Quentin shrugged, wiping at his eyes. “No. I…”

“It’s okay,” Eliot said, feeling anything but okay. “It’s just…” _Did you really want to die?_ The question perched itself on the tip of his tongue, itching to break free. He choked it back, he tucked it away. “We can talk about it later.”

Quentin blinked. “I’m sorry I… I don’t know what to say, I—”

“I want to feel it again,” Eliot blurted without a single thought behind the words. There was something in Quentin’s eyes, something that had drawn them out.

“You want to feel…”

“Love. For you. For... “ Eliot traced the curve of Quentin’s knee under the covers with a gentle hand, and Quentin only flinched a little at the contact, relaxing into it after a moment. “I want to… be in love with you again.”

The emotions washing over Quentin’s face were hard to pin down: anguish, devotion, confusion, relief. “Okay, I… okay.” Quentin laughed, and Eliot couldn’t decide if the sound of it was happy or sad. “But your shade, it’s…”

“Alice said it could be mended.”

Quentin seemed to glow from the inside out at the sound of those words. “Oh...”

“I didn’t… I…” Eliot sighed. “I couldn’t do magic before. When I thought you were dead, it just… it was gone. But then it came back, without my shade. And I thought… I don’t know.” A nervous laugh broke out of his chest. And, jesus, he was actually nervous. No, scratch that. Julia was right. Eliot was terrified. “I guess the magic is just an excuse. Because the truth is, I’m as much a coward now as I’ve ever been. But I… I want to try to be… brave.”

Quentin’s eyes went all soft and wide, and a smile twitched over his face. They were silent for a moment, both of them unmoving, and Eliot could only sit there trying to read between the lines of Quentin’s shifting expression. But then he tossed the covers back and pushed past Eliot as he pulled himself to his feet, his body language spilling nothing but pure fucking determination.

Quentin muttered to himself, something about mending that Eliot couldn’t make out, and he made a beeline for the dresser, throwing open the lid of Eliot’s stash box, pulling out the silver compact. The moment he flipped it open, Eliot’s pulse picked up.

“Q, you’re not strong enough to—”

“I’m fine.” The shattered mirror flickered and pulsed in Quentin’s hand. “I can do this.”

“Q…”

Quentin didn’t flinch, laser-focused on the task set out before him. He flourished his deft fingers over the mirror, and all at once the fractured glass began to heal, the web of shattered pieces coming back together as though they had always been one.

Eliot want to go to him, but his body was all useless deadweight, cemented to the bed. “Is it…” 

Quentin looked to him then, his mouth upturning in a smile. “Not yet. That was just the glass. I can feel it, it’s… too much. Too big. But I… I think I have an idea.”

Quentin crossed the short distance between them, standing just out of reach from where Eliot sat on the bed. He cradled the compact gently in his hands and brought it to his face, as though he might be studying himself in the newly mended glass.

Eliot frowned. “What are you doing?”

“I don’t know,” Quentin said. “But I have to give it a shot.”

Without hesitation, Quentin drew in a gasping breath. Eliot hardly had time to register what was happening until it was already done. The compact rattled in Quentin’s hands, and as the air moved into his lungs, Eliot’s shade began to slip away from the glass, flowing like water in between his parted lips. Eliot was still paralyzed where he sat, watching as thin tendrils of blue light entered Quentin’s body and then died away.

And for a moment, Quentin could only stare, looking to Eliot with wide, unblinking eyes, like he’d just witnessed something terrible, or done something even worse. The compact slipped out of his hand and shattered to the floor, and in a flash he went down to his knees, giving Eliot a start, unfreezing him from where he sat at last, forcing his legs to move on instinct. 

Eliot fell to the floor, taking Quentin roughly by the shoulders. “Hey. Q. Talk to me. What the fuck did you just do?”

“I don’t know…” Quentin croaked out something terrible, a sound like his insides were being carved out right there, his expression twisting as he nearly doubled over. “Fuck. Eliot. It’s in pieces. I can feel it.”

Jesus. What the fuck did he just do? “Just take it out, Quentin.” Eliot gripped him tightly in a desperate attempt to keep him upright, swallowing down a sudden swell of panic. “Don’t—”

“No!” Quentin wrenched out of Eliot’s grasp, shoving his hands away. “No. Just… please. You have to let me try.”

From deep inside Quentin’s chest, Eliot swore he heard a ringing, like the tinkling of glass, something sharp and bright, a sound that seemed to grow and grow. Quentin couldn’t keep the agony from his face as he pressed a hand to the center of his chest, and from under the fabric of his shirt a dim light began to glow, like he might be catching fire from the inside out.

“Oh,” Quentin groaned, meeting Eliot’s gaze head-on. “I can… I can feel you. I can feel you inside of me.” A sob slipped out of his chest. “I think it’s… coming together. Oh, El. You were in so much pain. I can… I can feel everything.”

Fat tears began to fall from Quentin’s eyes, and it was all Eliot could do to keep his hands to himself. The glow emanating from his chest lit the room around them a brilliant blue, and Quentin’s whole body seemed to vibrate, guttural sounds bubbling up from his throat as though he might truly be burning alive. 

“Maybe you should stop,” Eliot heard himself saying, distantly, feeling entirely apart from himself as he watched what he knew might be Quentin dying all over again right before his eyes, and he almost wanted to laugh at the irony.

Quentin shook his head, the glow inside him burning brighter, the ringing sharp and high, the air quivering like a struck tuning fork, every muscle in his body straining until Eliot worried he might actually pop. And then as quickly as it had started, the sound coming from his chest went silent, and the light began to die away, and Quentin collapsed onto the floor in front of him with a broken sob.

Eliot was on him at once, taking Quentin by the arms and pulling him upright, his skin under Eliot’s hands warm and slick with sweat. “Are you... “ He studied Quentin’s face but couldn’t read it, finding his expression entirely blank for a moment.

And then all at once his face came to life, as though he’d been restarted from within, a laugh breaking out of his chest. “It worked,” Quentin choked, sitting back on his heels and running his hands through his hair. “I think it… I think it actually worked.”

“You mean…”

“Yes.”

Eliot worried his hands in his lap, his heart leaping wildly under his ribs making him dizzy. “Okay. Q… what the fuck.”

Quentin laughed again, a fresh swell of tears spilling from his eyes. “I don’t know. But if you’re… sure. About this. I… I think I have another idea.”

Eliot let his eyes sweep over Quentin’s face, and there could be no doubt. Without a word he nodded, and Quentin crawled forward until there was no space left between them, only their bodies and their breath, the gentle fire of Quentin’s skin washing over Eliot like a sunny day. 

“Hey,” Quentin breathed, reaching out a tentative hand and cradling Eliot’s face. 

Eliot sucked in a breath and held it.“Hey,” he said on an exhale, the word barely a whisper, every cell in his body captivated by Quentin’s touch, unable to make sense of what he was feeling, if it were anything at all.

Quentin pressed forward, brushing the wild tendrils of Eliot’s hair away from his brow, pressing his lips there in the wake of his fingers. And that... that Eliot _felt._ Deeper than the hollow spot carved out in his soul, deeper than the memory of what a feeling should be. It was real, and it was there, brought to life by the sweeping fire of Quentin Coldwater’s mouth. And when he pulled away, Eliot was trembling.

“Ready?” he asked, thumbing at Eliot’s cheek.

Eliot could only nod, and blink, and open himself completely to whatever Quentin had in mind. He thought, in that moment, that he would let him do anything, for better or for worse.

Quentin smiled, and cradled Eliot’s face in his hands, and Eliot let his eyes slide shut as he leaned in, slotting their lips together and stealing the air right out of his lungs. The kiss was gentle, and Eliot let out a little moan that Quentin swallowed down, smiling against his lips as he pulled away.

“Open your mouth,” Quentin whispered, and Eliot couldn’t help but laugh.

“Thought that was what I was doing.”

“Would you just do it?” Quentin nuzzled into him gently. “Please.”

Eliot smiled, and let his lips fall open, and in an instant Quentin’s breath began to move inside him, gentle as a whisper, and then hot as a flame. And with his breath came something deeper, something heavy that settled into the center of Eliot’s chest and moved down into his belly, a missing piece slotting itself firmly into place. All at once the heaviness fizzled away, and Quentin was licking into his mouth and they were kissing, and it was deep and languid and warm and oh, Eliot swore he could feel the sunlight then, spilling into his body and over his flesh, making flowers bloom.

It was like Eliot had been standing on solid ground, and then suddenly he was… falling. Just falling. Falling with no hope of ever seeing the ground again. He sobbed into Quentin’s mouth, the burden of two full weeks of unfelt emotion settling in like a punch to the gut. And oh, Quentin pulled him into his arms and he was warm, so warm, and he was solid and he was real and he was alive and he was _there,_ and it was like Eliot was realizing it for the very first time. 

Quentin was alive. Quentin was there. Quentin was tangling fingers into his hair and drawing him as close as their bodies could get, and Eliot sobbed, breaking the kiss with a whimper, burying his face in the hollow of Quentin’s throat for a moment just to breathe him in. He nosed up the line of his neck, and there it was. Everything. Everything, everything, _everything._

He peppered kisses along the curve of Quentin’s jaw, tears streaming down his face, his body quaking like at any second he might crack wide open, his hands pushing up the back of Quentin’s shirt to get at his skin and—

“Hey. Hey.” Quentin nudged Eliot back, taking his face into his hands, gazing deep into his eyes. “It’s okay. You’re okay. Tell me how you feel.”

“Everything,” Eliot choked, swallowing down another terrible beautiful utterly overwhelming swell of emotion. “I feel… everything.”

Quentin’s lips upturned in a smile. “That’s good… I think. It means…”

“You did it.” Eliot trailed his fingers up along the dip of Quentin’s spine and, fuck, he felt so good. He felt so _good._ How could he have ever been foolish enough to think he didn’t want this? “Holy shit, Q, you really fucking did it.”

It was agony, in truth, like shifting from endless dark to blinding light in an instant, and Eliot thought for a moment that he might be crushed under the weight of it all. Everything went all fuzzy for a moment, and somehow Quentin managed to get him up to his feet, and then up onto the bed. Eliot lay on his side and Quentin curled around him, burying his nose in the slope of his shoulder and holding onto him so tightly.

“You’re okay,” Quentin just kept whispering, a mantra and a prayer and a dream. “You’re okay, El. I’ve got you now.”

Eliot drifted on a wave of endless emotion, certain he would drown, keeping his head above water by the warm and living embrace of Quentin’s body alone. There was the Joy, the fear, the bone-deep sorrow. The confusion, the anger, the love. Feeling Quentin there with him was like a dream, or a ghost from another life, his breath coming hotly against Eliot’s neck, his hand pressing like a second heart to the center of his chest. 

They lay there for minutes or hours, Eliot couldn’t be sure, but eventually Quentin broke the silence. “You wanna hear something amazing?”

Eliot reached for Quentin’s hand, threading their fingers together. “More amazing than you having fucking super healing powers apparently?”

A silent laugh rolled through Quentin’s body and into Eliot. “Yeah. I, uh… I remember. Everything.”

Eliot shot him a look over his shoulder. “Everything?”

“Yeah. All my memories. As soon as I took your shade inside of me they… they were just there. All the missing pieces.”

Eliot shifted until he was lying on his back, and Quentin half-covered him from hip-to-shoulder. “Do you wanna talk about it?”

Quentin sighed. “You mean about how you’re an idiot or…”

Eliot gave him a little nudge. Jesus fuck he was so in love. “Watch it,” he said, the levity of the moment quickly giving way to dread. “No I… it’s not going to be a fun conversation, so… if you’re not feeling up to it...”

A momentary fear flashed in Quentin’s eyes. “No it’s… it’s okay,” he said, his voice cracking just a little. “What do you, uh… what do you wanna know?”

Eliot sat up, and Quentin followed, the two of them facing each other in the center of the bed, legs crossed and touching at the knees. “I…” he started and stopped, worrying his hands together in his lap. “This is really heavy and I feel like a dick for even doing this when… so much other shit just happened. But I don’t know that I can be okay without… getting it all out there.”

“Okay,” Quentin said softly, the uncertainty in his eyes making Eliot ache.

“Now that you remember…” He took a breath, his pulse drumming loudly in his ears and, fuck, he had not missed this particular feeling even a little. “Alice told us everything about what happened when you… did what you did. Before you died, or… whatever we’re calling what happened to you now. And she said you didn’t run, and it… it was like you didn’t even try.”

Quentin cast his eyes down to his hands. “It all happened so fast,” he muttered, and Eliot wanted nothing more than to hold him.

“You don’t… have to be ashamed. I just… wanted to know if you…”

Quentin lifted his eyes, and they were damp, and Eliot didn’t think he’d ever regretted starting a conversation as much as this. “If I wanted to kill myself?”

The words sank like a stone in Eliot’s belly, thick coils of dread rising up and holding them under. “Yeah. Something like that.”

Quentin was quiet for a long time, picking at the fraying hem of his shirt. “I don’t know that I have a good answer to that,” he said finally, his eyes unfocused, darting everywhere. “But I think… a part of me…” He smiled sadly, the tears that had been welling in his eyes spilling over. “I was so tired, El.”

“I know.” Eliot curled a hand around his knee, feeling helpless, feeling utterly fucking useless just sitting there waiting for him to continue.

“My whole life I… you know. And then I thought I was okay.” He shook his head, his pretty face so full of misery Eliot didn’t think he would ever forgive himself for taking this… there. “I don’t know. I didn’t really know what death was until I was… in it. I was in pieces in there, but I remember it all. And that was being dead, even if I wasn’t really… you know. And I don’t… El, I don’t want…”

“It’s okay.” Eliot reminded himself to breathe, just to fucking breathe, giving Quentin’s knee a squeeze because he had no idea what else he was supposed to do. “Take your time.”

“I don’t ever want to go back to that.” Quentin’s voice quavered. “I don’t. I… I want to be alive, El. Now. Here. With you. With… with everyone.”

“Okay. Hey…” Eliot reached out and thumbed a tear from Quentin’s burning cheek. “Okay. We don’t have to work it all out now, okay? And maybe… later. You could, I don’t know… talk to someone about…”

“You’re talking about therapy.”

“Yeah, I think I am.” Eliot laughed softly. And, okay, maybe he wasn’t totally useless. “And maybe I could… use it too. Maybe…” Quentin sighed with his whole body, and Eliot leaned in, pressing a gentle kiss to his forehead. “You look exhausted.”

Quentin answered with a tired smile. “I don’t know how. Feels like I’ve done nothing but sleep for weeks.”

“Yeah, well, that’s because you’ve done nothing but sleep for weeks.” Eliot smiled and pulled away. “Come on, lie back down with me.”

They lay facing one another, close but not touching, until Eliot reached out and pulled Quentin into his arms. The weight of Quentin’s body felt good against his chest, heavy and solid and real. “I really am sorry, you know,” he said, pressing a kiss to the top of his head. “For being an idiot.”

Quentin’s breathing had slowed, and Eliot knew that he was drifting. “I know,” he said, voice heavy and slow.

“You know that I’m sorry? Or that I’m an idiot?”

Quentin snuggled in a little closer and sighed. “Both.”

“Okay,” Eliot breathed, his body feeling like deadweight, yet weightless all at once, and a smile spread itself over his face. “Good.”

—

They slept for hours, and when Eliot woke it was to Quentin’s hand pressing up the front of his shirt, his fingers tracing a line along the ridges of his scar, the space where Margo’s axe had slipped into him and freed him from the Monster.

Eliot stirred, and Quentin looked up to meet his eyes. “Did it hurt?” he asked quietly.

Eliot shook his head, blinking the sleep from his eyes. “When it happened I didn’t feel it. It was only after… the wound kept tearing itself back open, so...”

“Margo’s axes are no joke,” Quentin said with a smile that quickly faded. “I’m sorry I wasn’t here to…”

“Don’t be sorry, you…” Quentin’s hand was warm against his belly, and Eliot’s body began to respond accordingly, desire sparking hotly from the tips of Quentin’s fingers. And, fuck, it had been a long time since Eliot had felt… this. This particular brand of pure, unfiltered want. “You, uh…”

The realization of what he was doing dawned on Quentin’s face. “Do you want me to stop?” he asked, stilling the movement of his fingers.

“No… I just…” Eliot’s whole body was coming to life, his limbs all fuzzy and buzzing with static, a deep blush staining his cheeks when he realized his dick was already painfully hard. “I just think…”

“We should take it slow.”

“Yes.”

Quentin pulled his hand away, resting it on Eliot’s chest over his shirt. “Okay.”

Eliot bit at the inside of his lip, willing his body to relax, hoping that Quentin wouldn’t notice or at least just… ignore. What was happening between his legs. All good things in time. “I guess… I should go tell everyone I got my soul back.”

“That would probably be a good idea,” Quentin gave him a sleepy smile. “And I guess I should… talk to Alice.”

Quentin pulled himself out of bed and went to the closet, and Eliot watched him with a lump growing in his throat. God. He was terrified, but not in a way he’d ever been before. No. This was something new. There was so much left to lose now. There was just… so much.

He swallowed down a coil of dread when Quentin shot him a smile over his shoulder. “Is there a reason one of my old sweaters is in here?”

Eliot’s blush began to return at once. He’d almost forgotten about the sweater. “I guess having swiss cheese for a soul made me sentimental.”

“Oh...” Quentin eyed him curiously, smiling as he stripped off his t-shirt, took the sweater out of the closet, pulled it on over his head. “How are you feeling now?”

“I don’t know...” The blush crept up to Eliot’s ears and down across his chest. It was like being transported back in time, almost. Only Quentin’s hair was different now, even shorter than the day they’d met. “Ask me again after we’ve decided that taking it slow is our worst plan to date.”

Quentin smirked. “Okay,” he said, going to the door.

Eliot got to his feet once Quentin had gone, stood there in the quiet, empty room, gazing down at his own hands, the shape of a spell already forming without any thought behind it. He could feel the magic flowing still, somewhere deep inside. Between his nimble fingers, sparks popped and fizzled away. He shook his hands out and started again, coaxing the fire from his bones. He shut his eyes and breathed in deep, the spell sputtering and stalling on his second attempt, but fully coming to life by the third, a tiny orb of light forming between his palms.

It was only the size of a tennis ball, but it was radiant and warm against his skin, and Eliot smiled as he released it from his hands, sending it floating up to illuminate a small corner of the room.

He fixed his hair and straightened his clothes, found Margo out on the balcony, sipping a glass of deep red wine, a half-empty bottle beside her.

“Hey,” he said, taking the seat next to her. “So I uh… plugged up the big gaping hole in my soul this morning.”

She frowned, setting down her glass carefully, putting a cigarette between her lips and sparking it to life. “And why should I believe you?” she asked, a tendril of smoke slipping out from between her lips.

“Why would I lie about something like that?”

She shrugged. “You’re terrified of being alone and think it’s the only way I’ll go on a planet-hopping-alien-cock-sucking-orgy-adventure with you.”

Eliot laughed softly. “Okay, first… I would totally suck an alien cock.”

“I know,” she said, a smile tugging at her mouth. “We made a list.”

“That was a good list.” He sighed, studying the tense lines of her face. “Look, I’m sorry, Bambi. For… probably too many things to name right now. But mostly for being a raging dick and shutting you out and… generally being shit at telling you how I feel.”

Hope was sparking warmly in her eyes when she met his gaze. “Thought you said it couldn’t be fixed. Your shade.”

“Quentin fixed it.” He shrugged as though it were nothing. “Good as new.”

She took another long drag of her cigarette, studying his face with intent. “If you’re fucking with me, El, your soul isn’t gonna be the only thing around here with a brand new hole, if you catch my drift.”

He laughed, taking the offered cigarette from between her fingers. “Loud and clear, Bambi. Come here, I wanna tell you something.”

He pulled her into his lap, and they passed the cigarette back and forth until it was gone. Tentatively, she relaxed against his chest, letting him card his fingers through her long hair.

“So what is it?” she asked, her voice going soft.

“I wanna make you a promise,” he said.

“Don’t,” she said, gazing up at him. “That’s literally just asking for things to go to shit.”

He laughed softly. She had a point. “Okay. How’s this: I’m gonna try to not be such a massive fuck-up from now on.”

“And admit that you’re in love with Coldwater,” she insisted.

“Already done.”

That earned him a nudge and a smirk. “You told him?”

“He knows.” Eliot let that sit a moment. “Well, I might have said it in the past tense—”

“No.” She pulled back and took his face in her hands, piercing him with her gaze. “You gotta use your words. Tell him how you feel now. You hear me?”

He sighed as she settled back against his chest. “I hear you.”

—

Eliot passed Quentin in the kitchen. He was walking away from Alice with his head ducked, exhaustion dragging down his body and his face. He offered Eliot a tired smile, and Eliot ran a hand along the slope of his shoulder, then stood watching as he wound his way up the spiral staircase.

Eliot turned his attention to Alice once he’d gone. “So,” he said, leaning against the counter, feeling the full weight of the awkwardness between them. “I…”

“Quentin told me,” she said, lifting her eyes to him. “It’s good.” The awkward pause that followed made Eliot want to run for the nearest door. “About your shade, I mean.”

“Yeah. It is. I’m…” He sighed with his entire body, straightening his back. “I’m sorry for being a dick. And… thank you. For helping me. For trying to help me when I…”

“Of course.” She gave him a tense smile. “That’s what friends do, right?”

“Right,” he said, then asked, “Are you okay?” because he didn’t know what else to say, and because he genuinely wanted her to be.

“I don’t know,” she said, the exhaustion evident in the slump of her shoulders. “I think things are just going to be weird until they aren’t.”

“Yeah. They are.” And awkward, Eliot thought, so painfully horribly awkward. “But you know if you… need anything. I’m here for you, Alice. We all are.”

“I know. Thank you,” she said, looking down at her hands, then back to him. “But I think for right now I just need to try and figure out what I need to do for me.”

“Okay.” He gave her a little smile, uncertain what he was feeling, deciding that maybe for now that was fine. “But you’ll let me know if I can do anything to help?”

“Yeah,” she said, looking tired and happy and sad and relieved all at once. “I will.”

—

That night, Eliot found Quentin in bed, making little sounds in his sleep. Clicking on the bedside lamp he touched the curve of his shoulder, and Quentin jerked awake, eyes darting wildly around the room, wide with confusion until they settled on Eliot’s face.

“Oh,” he croaked, sighing as he let his body relax. “Hey.”

“Sorry. I didn’t mean to wake you.” Eliot crawled onto the bed, resting his head on the empty pillow beside him, tucking his long legs in. “Well, okay. That’s a lie.”

Quentin smiled, his eyes heavy with sleep. “It’s okay. I was having a pretty shitty dream anyway.”

“Do you wanna talk about it?”

“Not really.”

“Okay.” Eliot reached for him, trailing his knuckles gently down the slope of his cheek. “You talked to Alice.”

“Yeah. It’s… weird. But good, I think. Now that we’ve officially decided to just be friends.”

“Yeah. That is good.” Eliot said, then shifted his body closer, close enough to feel the heat spilling from Quentin’s skin.

“What are you doing?” Quentin’s eyes sparkled in the lamplight. “Thought we were… gonna take it slow.”

“We are, but I…” Eliot’s blood was moving faster now, and he slipped a hand along the back of Quentin’s neck. “Maybe I just wanted to be close to you.” He nuzzled into Quentin’s cheek, softly, fighting the urge to press him down onto the bed and kiss him breathless. “Is that okay?”

“Yeah,” he said, voice going all soft and breathy. “It’s good.”

“Good.” Eliot shut his eyes, just letting himself _feel_ it for a moment, Quentin’s body like a little fire coming to life against his chest. “Would it be all right if I kissed you?”

Quentin pawed at the front of Eliot’s shirt, bunching it up in his fist, letting out a broken whimper. “If you do... I don’t know… if I’ll be able to stop myself.”

Eliot smiled, peeking at Quentin through the slit of one eye. “Stop yourself from what?” he asked, and he’d meant for it to sound teasing, but the words just came out all desperate puffs of air.

“You know. Um…” Quentin’s breath was coming very quickly now, and Eliot could feel it moving in his chest. “You know what I mean. I… I didn’t wanna stop earlier either, and...”

Eliot took a breath. “I know,” he said, exhaling slowly and forcing himself to pull back a little. “So… okay.” Eliot laughed, giving himself a moment to breathe. “I won’t kiss you… for now.”

Quentin nodded, finally loosening his grip on Eliot’s shirt. “Okay,” he breathed. “For now.”

—

Eliot woke to Quentin talking in his sleep, curled in on himself on the far side of the bed. His words were mostly nonsense and gibberish, a distressed little whine escaping his throat every now and then. And sometimes, a word, loud and clear as a bell, a plea and a command: “No.”

Carefully, Eliot threw back the covers and moved across the space between them. Quentin gasped and flopped onto his back, eyes screwed shut against the gentle light of the illumination spell that Eliot breathed to life above them, his jaw clenched as tightly as his fists. And when Eliot touched him, Quentin bolted upright, shouting something that sounded like, “Please!”

Eliot popped up beside him, soothing a hand down the back of his neck that Quentin shied away from. “Q. Hey. It’s me. It’s okay. It was just a dream.”

His brow damp with sweat, Quentin looked to Eliot with confusion in his eyes. “Shit. El… hey. Fuck. Sorry.”

“Don’t apologize.” Eliot hesitated to touch him again. “Are you okay?”

Quentin let his unfocused eyes wander around the room. “It was just a dream.”

“Yeah. Do you wanna tell me about it?”

“I don’t know.” Quentin flopped back down onto his pillow, and Eliot lay beside him. “It’s the same dream I’ve been having for a while.”

“Okay.” Eliot reached over and gently touched his face, and this time Quentin didn’t flinch. “I’m here. You can tell me. But only if you want to.”

Quentin swallowed, blinked. “Okay. It’s, uh… I’m back in there. In the mirror. And I can, um… I can see you on the other side. And I keep thinking that you see me, but then you turn away.”

“Oh, Q.” Eliot moved closer, stopping just short of pulling Quentin into his arms. “I’m here.”

“I know.”

Deep under Eliot’s ribs, a terrible aching bloomed. “I did see you, you know,” he said. “I don’t think I ever told you. I’m not sure if Alice did, but… when you were in there, I saw you. Alice said it was just an echo, but…”

“Oh.” Quentin frowned at that. “I didn’t know.”

“It’s okay.” Eliot touched the curve of Quentin’s neck, his shoulder, his arm. “You know that I see you now.”

“Yeah…” Quentin pressed a hand to the center of Eliot’s chest, and for a moment they just... breathed. “You saw me in the mirror, and that’s why you saved me.”

“Yes.”

Quentin sighed, letting his eyes fall shut. “I don’t think I ever thanked you for that.”

Eliot pressed his lips to Quentin’s brow, filling with so much love he thought he might just burst. “You did the same for me. When I was gone. You gave everything you had to bring me back.”

Quentin wrapped himself around Eliot then, burying his face in the hollow of his throat. “I’d do it again,” he mumbled, trembling in Eliot’s arms. “I’d do anything, El. Anything…”

“Yeah,” Eliot breathed, tears welling in his eyes as he pressed a kiss to the top of Quentin’s head. “So would I.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So. Not to spoil too much but. I think it's safe to say the remaining two chapters are the epitome of indulgent. And I'm pretty excited to share them with everyone. Thank you thank you thank you to everyone who has been reading along this whole time and commenting and generally being supportive and amazing. See y'all next week. <3


	6. Now

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Two days passed, and Eliot kept waiting for the other shoe to drop, for something to go wrong just like it always did. He told himself, it can’t just be this easy. I can’t just be allowed to have him. Somehow, we always lose. Somehow…

Two days passed, and Eliot kept waiting for the other shoe to drop, for something to go wrong just like it always did. He told himself, it can’t just be this easy. I can’t just be allowed to have him. Somehow, we always lose. Somehow…

He watched Quentin across the counter pouring cereal into a bowl, the words that had been gathering in his chest for days perching themselves on the tip of his tongue. “So, uh… there’s something that I need to tell you.”

Quentin set down the cereal box, and his face fell at once. Eliot knew exactly what he was thinking, that he’d also had been walking around just waiting for this all to fall apart. “Okay…”

Eliot took a deep breath and let it out, feeling brave as he met Quentin’s eyes. “I just want you to know that, uh… I really fucking love you, Q. And I know that you know. I know. But…” A nervous laugh fell out of his mouth, and he had to grip the edge of the counter to steady his legs. “You’re the only one for me, Q. You’re the only one. It’s always been you. Even when I was doing my best to lie to myself. There’s never been anyone else.”

Quentin just stood there blinking at him for a moment, but when he spoke it was with a blush forming high on his cheeks. “So, uh… are you saying you wanna spend the rest of your life with me?”

Eliot smiled, his eyes growing damp. “I think that’s exactly what I’m saying.”

Quentin rounded the counter without a word, crowding Eliot up against the edge when he reached the other side, running his hands up the front of his shirt. “Then what the fuck are we waiting for, El?”

Eliot shuddered as Quentin pressed their bodies together, his pulse picking up. And, fuck, he was already getting hard. “We, uh… we said… we…”

“No, you said…” Quentin pressed a gentle kiss to the center of his throat, and Eliot felt it run through his whole body. “You said to take it slow, but since we’ve firmly established that you’re an idiot…”

“Well, I think technically you’re the one who said it, Q, but…” A silent laugh rolled through Eliot’s chest. “That’s… fair.”

“If you wanna be with me…” Quentin nipped at his jaw, snaking his arms around Eliot’s middle. “Then be with me. Now. Right here.”

Quentin dragged his lips down the line of his neck, and Eliot thought he might melt into the floor right there. Or maybe just pass out. “Are you sure?”

“If you could just…” Quentin pressed his strong hands along the dip of Eliot’s back. “Turn your brain off for ten minutes and let me blow you, this would all go a lot smoother, El.”

“Jesus fuck, Q,” Eliot laughed, his whole body quaking with desire, and he threaded his fingers in Quentin’s hair just to steady himself. “Do you have any idea what you do to me?”

Quentin’s pressed his hips forward, rocking against the line of Eliot’s growing erection, and Eliot had to bite back a moan. “I think I have an idea.” He reached up, popping open a single button on Eliot’s shirt. “So… is that a yes?”

_Fuck yes,_ Eliot wanted to shout, because he’d honestly never wanted anything more, but then he remembered that technically they still lived with Quentin’s ex-girlfriend, and, well… “You really think it’s a good idea to suck my dick where our friends could walk in at any minute?”

Quentin hummed, leaning up to smile against Eliot’s mouth. “I do,” he whispered, stealing Eliot’s lips in a languid, searing kiss and, yeah. Okay. This was definitely the best idea that Quentin had ever had.

Eliot wrapped Quentin up in his arms, the whole world tipping on its axis around them, his body coming to life in waves of pleasure and love. He pushed his hands up the back of Quentin’s shirt to feel his skin and oh, there is was, all that beautiful fire.

Quentin broke the kiss, and they were both a little breathless when he said, “I want you,” and all at once Eliot’s knees turned to water.

“I want you too,” Eliot said, his voice just as wrecked as his heart. Quentin was already lowering himself to his knees and. Fuck. Eliot could only reach back and steady himself on the edge of the counter.

Quentin stared up at him with parted lips. “Take off your shirt,” he said, fumbling with the buckle of Eliot’s belt, looking like something that just stepped out of a goddamn dream.

Eliot made quick work of his buttons with the help of a little magic, and tossed his shirt back onto the counter as Quentin tugged his pants down to his knees. Everything was happening so fast it made him dizzy, delirious with desire as he reached down and ran his fingers through Quentin’s hair, his dick so hard he didn’t understand how there was any blood left to keep the rest of his body going.

“You know what the best part of remembering the mosaic is, El?” Quentin sat back on his heels, a smile tugging at his lips. “It’s that I know exactly how you like it, even though, technically speaking, we’ve only actually slept together once in this timeline, and uh...”

Eliot laughed, his chest swelling until he was certain his love would spill right over, drowning them both alive. “Go on… tell me about the timeline thing.”

“I’m just saying it’s…” Quentin blushed, the lines of his body going all soft. “It’s nice that we… know each other even though we, you know, we haven’t…”

“Don’t get shy on me now, Q.” He thumbed at Quentin’s burning cheek. “Unless of course you’ve changed your mind.”

Quentin’s face only grew redder at that. “I haven’t… I…” He turned his eyes from Eliot’s face to his dick, licking his lips and pressing one warm hand flat to the bare skin of Eliot’s hip. “I want to. So much. I’ve been thinking about it… for days.”

“Have you?” Eliot gripped his hair, an animal lust stirring in his veins, and Quentin pushed forward, both his hands now on Eliot’s hips. “Tell me.”

“I, uh…” Quentin swallowed, his fingers tracing poetry along the lines of Eliot’s bones. “I’ve been thinking about the memories. Of Fillory. There are so many…”

“There are.” He gave Quentin’s hair a little tug, thrilling at the look it sparked in his dark eyes. “Could fill a book with all the filthy things that mouth can do.”

Quentin whispered, “Yes,” wrapping his fingers around the base of Eliot’s cock, making him gasp, making his toes curl against the cool planks of the floor. “I want it.”

“Then take it,” Eliot said firmly, his voice only quavering a little as he released his hold on Quentin’s hair, and—fuck. It was truly a miracle he was still upright as Quentin leaned forward and pressed the tenderest kiss imaginable to the head of Eliot’s cock.

Eliot white knuckled the edge of the counter. It was all that he could do, eyes firmly locked on Quentin at his feet, his breath coming very quickly now. It was like something out of a dream, only better, sweeter than any memory could possibly hope to be. Quentin licked a stripe up the underside of Eliot’s cock, then smiled, his pretty mouth falling open.

Eliot held his breath for a moment, and when he let it out it was like breathing for the very first time. Quentin took him into his mouth, lavishing Eliot with his tongue slowly, slowly and… god. Eliot’s thighs were already trembling. Quentin pulled back, looked to Eliot with soft, questioning eyes, stroking him with a firm hand from root-to-tip.

Eliot ran his knuckles down Quentin’s cheek. “You’re so good to me,” he whispered, a swell of emotion threatening to pull him under. Why the fuck would he think denying himself such pleasure, such love, such unabashed _joy_ was ever a good idea?

Quentin smiled, parting his lips as though to speak, but taking Eliot back into his mouth instead, deep enough to gag this time, tears pricking in his eyes when he pulled away.

“Take it slow, baby,” Eliot said, trembling everywhere, already teetering so close to the edge, but Quentin only shook his head. 

“Don’t want to,” he muttered, diving back in before Eliot could even hope to respond.

It was like he had something to prove, or maybe he was just making up for so much lost time, for all those months and years they’d danced around each other in this life. For ever being foolish enough to think they should take this slow. Quentin was ravenous, moaning like Eliot was the one on his knees, like he couldn’t get enough, like he might drown or starve or cease to exist if he slowed down for even a second.

“Sweetheart,” Eliot purred, overwhelmed when Quentin’s fingers came up to dance along the line of his scar. “I love you,” he cried as Quentin took him as deep into his throat as he could manage, slick and warm and marvelous.

“I love you so much, El,” Quentin panted hotly against his hip, letting his hand do the work while he caught his breath. “Want you to come in my mouth.”

And with those words, Eliot knew he was a goner.

It was like flipping a switch. Like Quentin’s words had commanded his body to do it. Eliot felt every muscle drawing tight, and then he was coming, the pleasure wrenched out of his bones as he shot all over Quentin’s lips with a sob, streaking across his face, marking him completely. Eliot fought the urge to shut his eyes, to hide away as he crumbled to pieces, his vision going all soft and blurry at the edges. Quentin’s tongue darted out, hungrily lapping at every drop of his release, pressing tender kisses to the head of his cock until Eliot started going soft in his hand.

Utterly boneless, Eliot slumped down to the floor, and Quentin was on him in an instant, licking into his mouth, still filthy with Eliot’s come, making a mess of them both. 

“Fuck,” Eliot breathed when Quentin pulled back, laughing when he tried to move his legs and found his pants in a tangle at his ankles.

“Yeah,” Quentin knocked their foreheads together with a dopey smile, muttering a cleanup spell that made quick work of their mess. 

They sat there for a moment, just breathing together, Eliot’s head all fuzzy with afterglow, his limbs tingling like television static, and it took him a moment to register when Quentin started to pull away.

“Hey,” he whimpered. “Where are you going? It’s my turn now…”

Quentin stumbled to his feet, the front of his pants tenting obscenely, and tossed Eliot’s shirt down from the counter. “We have the rest of our lives, remember?”

Quentin turned on his heels with a smile, and Eliot only managed to get to his feet because… fuck. He’d never wanted to kiss someone so breathless in all his life. He dressed as quickly as he could manage with his trembling hands, then tottered into the living room, found Quentin on the sofa and flopped down next to him, burying his face in the crook of his neck. “You’re a brat,” he mumbled, and Quentin laughed, wasting no time getting fingers in his hair.

“And you’re impatient. We have all day…”

Eliot hummed, nosing up along the side of his neck. He was warm, and soft, and he smelled so fucking good that Eliot just wanted to… devour him. Right there. “Mhmm, all day for me to do terrible things to you.”

Quentin gasped when Eliot pushed a hand up the front of his shirt. “What, uh… what sort of things?”

“Use your imagination,” he purred, sucking a tender kiss just below Quentin’s ear. “You have all the same memories that I do…”

“Yeah.” Quentin’s belly fluttered under Eliot’s touch. “You know how… how to make me feel good.”

“Mm, I do.” Eliot nosed along Quentin’s jaw, pressing a kiss to the corner of his mouth. “Gonna make you feel so fucking good, sweetheart.”

“Can I…” Quentin let out a needy little whine, and Eliot felt it in his chest. “Can I fuck you?”

Eliot let a shudder roll through him completely, curving a hand around Quentin’s erection through his pants, sucking a kiss into his throat. “That what you want, baby? Wanna put that pretty dick inside me?”

Quentin arched up into the touch, lips falling open as Eliot half-crawled into his lap. “Fuck yes,” he croaked, voice thick and ruined, grabbing at Eliot’s ass when he straddled his thighs.

Eliot leaned down, nipping at Quentin’s bottom lip. “Good.” He kissed the spot where his teeth had been, then pressed his lips to Quentin’s ear. “You wanna hear a secret, my love?”

Quentin squeezed his ass, pulling him closer. “Yes.”

He stroked a hand through Quentin’s hair with a smile. “I don’t think there’s a single thing I wouldn’t let you do to me,” he whispered.

When Eliot sat back, Quentin’s face was flushed a deep cherry red, his eyes lust-blown and his cock straining at his zipper. He licked his lips, letting his hands come to rest on Eliot’s hips. “That’s…” He looked as though he wanted to eat Eliot alive. And, god, how Eliot wanted him to. “Good to know.”

Eliot wrapped a hand around Quentin’s throat, gently, leaning in, stealing the whisper of a kiss before pulling away. “You wanna take me to bed?”

For a moment Quentin only stared, as though he might be frozen. But then he began to nod slowly, and Eliot smiled, stumbling to his feet and pulling Quentin up after him, all but running to the room he was now thinking of as simply theirs. 

Their room. Their bed. Their home.

Eliot kicked the door shut behind them, shoving Quentin down onto the bed and straddling his hips, licking into his mouth, swallowing down his greedy moans. He pinned Quentin’s wrists high above his head, feeling absolutely ravenous, gazing down at him with a hungry smile, marveling at his… everything. His eyes and his mouth and the cut of his jaw. The way wild tendrils of hair stuck up every which way like a halo. And down between his legs, Eliot was growing hard again.

“See what you do to me?” He rolled his hips, pressing his hardness into Quentin’s through their pants. “Oh, baby, you drive me wild. Do you know how fucking beautiful you are, Q?”

Quentin pressed up into him, struggling against Eliot’s hands where he had him pinned. “Wanna touch you,” he whined. “El, please. You said… you said I could…”

“Shh, it’s okay. What did I say, my love? Hm?”

“You said I could do anything…” Quentin was quite literally pleading with his eyes, and it was enough to make Eliot _ache_ down between his legs. “Anything I want.”

“Oh,” Eliot purred, releasing his grip at once, “but you can. Oh baby, you can. Anything. You wanna touch me?”

“Yes.” The word came out all soft and broken, and Quentin pawed at the front of Eliot’s shirt, fumbling with a button. “Please.”

Eliot did a tut, and the buttons popped open one-by-one. “There we go. Where do you wanna touch me?”

“Everywhere.” Quentin’s fingers skittered over Eliot’s abdomen like gentle little flames. “Please.”

“Greedy boy.” Eliot smirked. “Don’t wanna let me have a turn?”

“No.” He shoved at Eliot with his hips, just a little bratty in the way that he whimpered. “Get on your back and—and take off your… everything.”

Eliot had to take a second to catch his breath, finding this all more than a little overwhelming. He breathed in, he breathed out, he peeled off his shirt and tossed it away, rolling onto his back with a smile, shoving his pants and underwear down as quickly as he could manage and kicking them to the floor. He looked to Quentin kneeling beside him, his mouth hanging open like a man about to feast, and gave the hem of his shirt a tug.

“Now this isn’t fair,” he said. “Let me see you, sweetheart. Please.”

His eyes wide and dark and wanting, Quentin gave a nod, fumbling his shirt up over his head. Quentin struggled with his pants and underwear in a way that was so endearing Eliot thought he might just die. Eliot watched him fondly as he moved to the foot of the bed and kicked them away, then crawled back over to his side.

“Better?” Quentin asked, flushing down to his chest, his cock standing rigid and leaking at the tip.

Eliot raked his gaze up Quentin’s body, settling on his eyes, his parted lips, aching to touch, but resisting for now. “Perfect. Now where do you wanna touch me first?”

Quentin laughed softly. “Am I allowed to say your dick?”

Eliot clucked his tongue. “Haven’t had your fill of that yet, hm?”

“No.” Quentin’s eyes wandered down Eliot’s body to the place where his cock lay leaking against his belly, and he dragged two trembling fingers up the length of it. “It’s… perfect.” He swallowed, meeting Eliot’s gaze. “I wanna ride it.”

Unable to resist any longer, Eliot curved his hand around Quentin’s thigh, biting back the whimper threatening in his chest “You can. You will. There’s so much time for that, darling. But first you promised to fill me up, remember?”

Quentin sucked in a breath, considered him in silence for a moment, then straddled Eliot’s hips. “Was that a promise?”

“I hope so.” Eliot ran his hands up the backs of Quentin’s thighs, up to his ass and down again, his chest drawing so tight that it almost hurt to breathe. “I really want it, Q. Where do you wanna touch me now?”

Quentin let his eyes rake down the length of Eliot’s torso, and he pressed his fingers to the dip of Eliot’s hip. “How about here?”

“You like that?”

“Yes. You’re beautiful.” He dragged his fingers up, up, up until they rested in the center of Eliot’s chest. “Here. So I… can feel your heart.”

“That’s good.” Eliot’s voice came out all air, his heart going absolutely wild under his ribs, his body pinned to the mattress by the weight of Quentin’s gaze alone.

“And…” The fire of Quentin’s fingers tracked down to the axe blade-shaped scar on his belly. “Here. Can you feel it?”

Eliot shook his head, amazed he could even move. “Not anymore. But I can feel you.”

Quentin bent his body in two, pressing his lips to the line of Eliot’s scar. A warmth spread itself through Eliot’s body then, and he felt the kiss everywhere. In the tips of his fingers, down to the soles of his feet. “I’m so happy you’re alive,” he said, sounding as though he might cry at any second.

“Yeah,” Eliot choked, utterly consumed by the moment. “I’m happy you’re alive, too.”

When their mouths slotted together this time it was without any rush, a languid and aching kiss, the slick slide of their cocks trapped between their bodies making Eliot moan. Quentin swallowed the sound, punctuating it with one of his own before pulling away, panting and breathless and beautiful.

“How about,” Eliot said softly, his voice a mess of arousal and love, “you let me touch you for a little while?”

Quentin considered him silently, flushed from his ears to his cock, then rolled off and onto his back without protest, a smile tugging at his mouth, reaching for Eliot when he pulled himself up to kneel at his side.

Eliot ran a hand up Quentin’s chest slowly, feeling it rise and fall, doing his best to keep his own breathing steady and even. “Spread your legs for me, baby,” he said.

“Don’t make me come yet,” Quentin whined, and Eliot had to laugh.

“I won’t.” He pressed a kiss to Quentin’s chest, right over the thumping of his heart. “Just wanna use my mouth on you a little. Would that be okay?”

Quentin sighed hard and gave him a little nod, and Eliot smiled, moving down to settle in the space between his parted thighs.

“That’s perfect.” Eliot ran a hand up the inside of one thigh and then the other. “You’re so good for me.”

Late morning sun streamed in through the blinds, kissing Quentin’s naked flesh in streaks of brilliant gold. Eliot wrapped a hand around his leaking cock and gave it a single stroke, just to watch him move in the light. To see him arch up off the bed and chase the touch when Eliot pulled his hand away.

“Touch me, El,” Quentin moaned, spreading his legs a little wider, and in all his life Eliot didn’t think he’d ever seen anything quite so inviting. 

“Soon, my love,” Eliot promised, pressing a kiss to the curve of his knee. “I could watch you like this forever.”

“Please don’t,” Quentin huffed out a laugh, and Eliot’s chest swelled with devotion, an ache that went down to his bones, and deeper, something that sparked hotly in every cell, in the very fabric of his dna.

“Okay,” Eliot relented after a moment, bending down to nuzzle at the underside of Quentin’s pretty cock. “I won’t torture you.”

Quentin reached for him, getting his fingers in Eliot’s hair as he lapped up the precome dripping down his shaft, broad swipes of his tongue wrenching moans out of his chest. Eliot stroked Quentin once, twice, reveling in the music spilling out of him, then taking him slowly into the heat of his mouth.

Thrusting upward, Quentin cried out Eliot’s name, tugging at his hair until it hurt, and Eliot pulled away laughing. “Now who’s the impatient one?” 

Quentin whined when Eliot’s tongue went back to work, catching beads of pre-come as they dripped from his slit. “You said you wouldn’t torture me.”

Eliot grinned, pinning down Quentin’s hips when he started to squirm. “Just want a little taste, baby. You wouldn’t deny me that, would you?”

“No,” Quentin huffed. “But, fuck… El…” He laughed as Eliot moved down to his balls, lavishing them with his tongue, and then lower, that sensitive strip of skin just below. “Oh, you’re the worst. Fuck…”

“You love it. And I love this.” Eliot nosed up the line of his cock, nuzzling it tenderly. “Gonna fuck me with this gorgeous dick, hm? Gonna stick it in me deep?”

Without another word, he swallowed Quentin to the root, flattening his tongue and lapping at his balls just to hear him—fuck. Just to hear him _sob_ , to feel the strength in his hips as he arched up off the bed into the tight heat of Eliot’s throat. He wanted to be ruined by Quentin, he wanted to be used. He wanted to give him so much pleasure that neither of them would move for days after it was through.

He gripped Eliot’s hair and fucked up into him once, twice, buried to the hilt and babbling a stream of endless nonsense. “You’re gonna make me come,” he whimpered, holding Eliot down for just a second longer before pulling him off.

“Yeah, baby,” Eliot huffed, spit dribbling from his mouth and down his chin. “Do that again.”

Quentin laughed, releasing his grip on Eliot’s hair. “I’ll come if I do.”

“Good,” Eliot purred, giving Quentin’s slick cock a single stroke, his own cock throbbing down between his legs. “Use my throat, sweetheart. Take what you need.”

Quentin threw his head back with a groan, bunching the covers up into tight fists at his side. “I hate you,” he whined. “Jesus fuck, I love you, El.”

Eliot crawled up and lay down beside him, their bodies curving together, one end and one beginning. Quentin shut his eyes and Eliot kissed each one, whispering, “I love you, I love you,” running his fingers up the dip of Quentin’s spine.

Quentin reached between their bodies, giving Eliot’s cock a clumsy stroke, mouthing at the curve of his jaw. “I dreamed of this,” he said, gasping when Eliot dragged two fingers softly between his cheeks and back again. “Even when you were… gone. I never stopped wanting you…”

Eliot drew him nearer, kissing the tip of his nose. “I’ll spend the rest of my life making it up to you.”

“Don’t… don’t,” Quentin breathed, burying his face in the hollow of Eliot’s throat. “Just love me, El. Just…”

Quentin rolled Eliot over onto his back, shoving his thighs apart and settling between them. “Tell me how…” he whispered, burying his fingers in Eliot’s sweat-damp hair, gazing straight into his eyes. “Tell me how you want it.”

“You know me,” Eliot said, locking his ankles at the small of Quentin’s back to draw him nearer. “You know how.”

“No.” Quentin shook his head. “I don’t care. Tell me.”

Eliot pulled Quentin into his arms, coaxing him to settle in against his chest, pressing a kiss into his hair. “I want you to finger me open nice and slow,” he said softly. “And then…” He soothed a hand down Quentin’s back, feeling him tremble, and trembling right along with him. “When you give me your dick, I want you to fuck me so hard I still feel you tomorrow.”

The words came out tenderly, dripping with love, and Quentin shuddered against his chest. For a moment, neither of them moved, and Eliot nosed into his hair, breathing deep, still not entirely certain this wasn’t all just some elaborate hallucination brought on by his grief. And if it was, he prayed to whatever gods might be listening that he’d never find his way back to reality again.

But then Quentin pulled away, hovering over Eliot with a smile, and love sparking in his eyes, and Eliot had never felt more awake in all his life, more _alive._ He did a tut and the drawer on the nightstand opened, the bottle of lube settling into his hand a moment later.

Quentin laughed, shaking his head. “Of all the things that magic can do…”

“I’m lazy by nature.” Eliot shrugged. “And I want your fingers inside me. Now.”

Quentin pulled away, sitting back on his heels and taking the bottle from Eliot’s hand. He was flushed from his ears to his chest, hair sticking to his brow, cock so hard it looked angry, and when Quentin gave it a single stroke—fuck. Eliot swore he felt it down between his own legs.

“Do that again,” Eliot said, and Quentin’s dark eyes narrowed, his blush growing impossibly deeper. 

“Touch myself?”

Eliot hummed. “You’re so fucking pretty, baby. Will you let me watch?”

Quentin swallowed, tucking his hair behind his ear. “Later… maybe. After…”

“Hey. It’s all right. Only if you want to, okay?” Eliot smiled, reaching for him across the distance. “Go on. Touch me, sweetheart.”

Quentin had grown visibly flustered, pushing Eliot’s knees apart, gently, popping open the lube to slick his fingers. Trembling and uncertain, he quickly dragged two fingers over Eliot’s hole.

“Hey. Hey. Slow down…” Eliot touched his shoulder gently and, jesus, he was shaking like a leaf. "Do you need a minute?”

“No.” Quentin shook his head, holding onto his own hand as though he’d just been burned. “It’s just…”

“I know. It’s a lot for me too.” He gave Quentin a soft look. “But I think I have an idea. Do you trust me?”

“You know I do.”

“Good.” Eliot pulled himself up to his knees, taking Quentin by the face, nuzzling into him softly. “Sit back against the headboard, stretch out your legs. Can you do that for me?”

Quentin nodded. “Yes.”

They parted slowly, and Quentin got himself into position. Eliot crawled to him, draping himself over Quentin’s lap, going up on his knees to get the perfect angle, his cock resting heavily against Quentin’s thigh.

“There,” Eliot said. “How’s that?”

“Good. It’s, uh…” Quentin placed a tentative hand on Eliot’s back. “That’s nice. Yeah…”

Eliot hummed happily. “Take your time now, baby. It’s all yours. Touch me how you want to.”

Eliot shut his eyes, letting his head fall down between his outstretched arms, and for a moment everything was still. His body thrummed with a delicious ache from the top of his skull to the points of his toes, Quentin’s hands resting firmly at the small of his back, a steady and promising weight.

Quentin drew in a breath, and Eliot felt himself fill with it, patient and wanting and warm. Finally, one of Quentin’s hands tracked down to Eliot’s ass, caressing tender circles into the flesh. The other hand moved up the line of his spine, to the dip between his shoulders, up to the nape of his neck to rake fingers through his hair. 

He gave Eliot’s ass a squeeze, tugging at his hair, and Eliot couldn’t help but laugh. “Having fun?” he muttered over his shoulder, every part of him that Quentin touched feeling absolutely electric.

Quentin responded with a gasp, and a little laugh of his own. “I love your body,” he said, sounding awe-struck, and Eliot wished that he could see his face.

“And my body loves you,” Eliot purred, rolling his hips to feel the slick slide of his cock against Quentin’s thigh.

Quentin’s hand disappeared from his backside, but it was back in an instant, connecting with his flesh with the gentlest of swats, experimental more than anything, not enough to sting, but enough to make Eliot arch up in search of more.

Eliot scoured the halls of his memory, smiling as Quentin’s hand rubbed a soothing circle into his skin. “Are you thinking of the same night that I am?”

“I have… memories of a few,” Quentin said, drawing his hand up again, reconnecting softly, and Eliot felt it from his cock down to his toes. “More than a few. In each one you’re… begging for more.”

Eliot sighed, so full of love he could hardly breathe. “That what you want? Want me to beg for you, sweetheart?”

“No.” Another swat. It felt like a kiss. “I just want to show you how much I love you.”

Quentin raked fingers down Eliot’s back, gently, swiped two careful fingers over his hole and back up again. Eliot did a tut and Quentin laughed as the bottle of lube picked itself up and floated over.

“Thank you,” Quentin said, amused, his words punctuated by the sound of the cap popping open, and a gentle stream dripping down between Eliot’s cheeks. His hands were steady, more confident in this position, hidden from Eliot’s gaze, and his fingers teased in gentle little circles over the puckered rim of Eliot’s hole until he was practically purring. “You like that?” he asked, his voice coming out all air and desperation, and Eliot arched up into the touch.

“I love it.” Eliot’s voice was a wreck, as devastated as his body under Quentin’s hands. “Go on. Let me feel you. Open me up to take that gorgeous dick.”

Quentin inhaled deeply, the tip of one finger, softly, pressing into Eliot’s body as he exhaled. He teased Eliot’s rim gently, making his cock ache where it was trapped between their bodies, then gave him half the length of his index finger in one smooth push. And, oh, it was beautiful, feeling Quentin inside him. Like being filled for the very first time. Even just a little, even just an inch.

He pulled his finger out, and Eliot whimpered. In his wildest dreams, this was how this story began, the two of them together in a bed, his flesh turning to music under Quentin’s touch. But Eliot’s dreams had always ended the same: dissolving into nightmares, alone in the dark and wanting, broken and foolish for ever having dreamed to begin with. But now here they were, somehow, shaping that dream into a garden, into the kingdom where their music might shape itself into a symphony, the press of Quentin’s fingers a promise from long ago.

Quentin added a second finger, slowly, and more lube than was probably necessary, but when he pressed inside this time Eliot saw their life together taking shape behind his eyes, something like a prayer slipping from his mouth. Quentin worked up a torturous rhythm, both of them huffing out ragged, desperate breaths as the seconds ticked on, his free hand dragging up and down the slope of Eliot’s back, the heartstrings that connected them perfectly in tune.

He knew exactly how to tease him, where to touch, that space inside to flutter over feather-light to draw from Eliot such sweet nonsense he might not have been speaking words at all. He put his memories to use, calling back to whispered secrets, like hidden messages in the dark. These bodies still so new to one another, but those memories like old friends, constant companions, a lifetime of knowledge making Eliot cry and tears burst like stars in the corners of his eyes.

Quentin pulled his fingers free. “I wanna fuck you now,” he said, his voice dark with wanting, and Eliot could feel the arousal spilling from him like a fever.

“Then do it,” Eliot practically growled, crawling out of Quentin’s lap and readying himself on his hands and knees, pressing his face to the bed, his back deeply arched, thighs spreading wide. He’d never wanted anything so terribly in his life. He needed— _needed_ —Quentin inside of him _now._

Quentin said something, but Eliot couldn’t hear it, his blood pounding furiously in his ears and drowning out the sound. The fingers of one hand digging roughly into Eliot’s hip, Quentin lined himself up with the other, trembling as he pushed the head of his cock in slowly, retreating almost at once. That point of contact between them became Eliot’s world as Quentin repeated the motion, the whole of the multiverse dissolving into the slick slide of flesh, two mouths breathing creation as Quentin snapped his hips, slipping ever-deeper into Eliot’s body.

He bottomed out and Eliot sobbed into the crook of his arm, pleasuring bringing every cell of his body to life. The two of them went still for a moment, the sound of their breathing filling the room, and when Quentin started moving again, Eliot could feel something piecing itself back together in his bones. Something deeper than his shade, something older, something that knew Quentin by the shape of his hands and the lilt of his voice in the dark.

Quentin draped himself over Eliot’s back, nipping at the nape of his neck, wrapping his arms around his middle and babbling into his skin. “You’re mine,” he said, sucking a kiss into Eliot’s shoulder, deep enough to bruise.

“I’m yours,” Eliot sobbed, teetering closer to the edge of oblivion with each passing second, full to bursting with pleasure and love. And it was—fuck. It was almost too much for his body to contain. Almost.

Quentin’s hand skirted along Eliot’s chest, down to his belly and back up again, skimming along the sensitive flesh of his nipples. Quentin knew the map of his body without question, drawing pleasure with aching precision from one point to the next, making Eliot cry, kissing him from the inside as he nosed along the back of his neck, whispering unspoken promises in the ancient language of their love. 

“I’m gonna come,” Quentin sobbed, his whole body quaking as he held onto Eliot for dear life. “Want you to come again too, El.”

“I’m not there yet,” Eliot huffed out a broken laugh. “Don’t worry about me right now. Take what you need, sweetheart.”

Quentin cried out something incoherent, pressing his face between Eliot’s shoulders, his hips beginning to falter. He came biting the back of Eliot’s neck, muffling his own broken sobs, still moving inside of Eliot with shallow thrusts until he started to go soft.

Pulling out of Eliot’s body, Quentin collapsed back onto the pillows with a great sigh. “Just give me… a second. Fuck…”

Eliot flipped over onto his back with a dopey grin, every part of him thrumming and light. “Take your time,” he said, giving himself a single lazy stroke, just to take the edge off, his eyes raking down the slick expanse of Quentin’s skin, so delighted just to lie there and… look at him.

Quentin crawled over after a moment with a smile on his face. He spread Eliot’s thighs and settled in between them. “Want my fingers?” he asked, his chest heaving and his hair sticking up at wild angles.

There was no more space left for hiding between them, Quentin’s eyes blown wide open with love. Eliot could only nod in response, spreading himself wider for Quentin to push into him, two fingers slipping in easily, slicked by his own come spilling out of Eliot’s body.

He found his prostate without hesitation, in no mood for teasing, his eyes locked on Eliot’s face as he massaged that spot that made his vision go all fuzzy at the edges. “Stroke yourself,” he breathed. “Come for me, El.”

The way Quentin moaned while pushing into him made Eliot feel like he was losing his mind. He fucked up into the tightness of his own fist, slick and sticky with pre-come leaking down his shaft, the room tipping around them in a dizzying haze. Quentin’s fingers hit their mark without fail, stoking a fire in Eliot’s belly, his balls drawing tight against his body, the pleasure almost too much to bear.

“Come for me,” Quentin repeated. “I wanna see you… please…”

Fireworks burst in Eliot’s vision, his legs trembling as his orgasm began to roll through him in bone-deep waves. He shot all over his belly and up to his chest, wringing himself dry with Quentin’s name falling from his lips before going boneless on the bed. Quentin pulled his fingers free, leaving Eliot terribly empty, but then he was on him again, lapping at the come spattered all over his chest, down to his navel, not leaving a single drop behind in his wake. 

Quentin curled up at Eliot’s side, tucking his face into the crook of his neck, making happy sounds and pressing gentle kisses into his skin. “I… really fucking love you,” he muttered, and Eliot wrapped him in his arms.

“I really fucking love you too.” Eliot pressed a kiss to the top of Quentin’s head, letting his eyes fall shut, drifting into a blissful, dreamless sleep almost at once.

When Eliot woke sometime later it was to empty arms, and in the split second of panic that followed he was certain it had all just been some beautiful dream. But then he turned his head and Quentin was there, on the far side of the bed, his chest rising and falling gently as he slept, his cock lying rigid against his belly.

Smiling, heart pounding out of his chest, Eliot cast a cleaning spell on himself and rolled out of bed carefully, trying his best not to wake him. He found a pair of soft pants in the closet and pulled them on, sneaking out to the kitchen, finding Margo there, thumbing at her phone at the counter.

“About fucking time you two banged,” she said when he opened the fridge.

Eliot smiled, pulling out a bottle of water. “Good morning to you too, Bambi.”

“It’s past noon, but I understand that time is meaningless when you’re in a boning coma.”

Laughing softly, he rounded the counter and pressed a kiss into her hair. “Wanna have dinner tonight?”

“Don’t make plans with me today,” she said firmly, punctuating her words with a smile. “Go on. Get back to your man.” 

He kissed her again and turned away. “And maybe put up a silencing ward,” she called after him. “Everyone on the block doesn’t need to hear Coldwater fucking your brains out.”

Eliot disappeared behind the bedroom door, blushing, his grin stretching so wide that it hurt. He woke Quentin quietly, pressing a kiss to his forehead. “Hey. You should probably drink this,” he said, pushing the water into Quentin’s hands when he sat up.

Quentin took a sip, squinting against the light. “What time is it?”

“Fuck if I know. Doesn’t matter.” He took the water from Quentin, took a sip, sat the bottle on the nightstand. Crawling onto the bed, he took Quentin’s face between his hands. “Time doesn’t exist today.”

Adoration burning in his eyes, Quentin straddled Eliot’s hips, burying his face in the crook of his neck. “I can’t believe this is really happening,” he laughed.

Eliot’s chest swelled with something that he couldn’t name, his fingers dragging up along the expanse of Quentin’s back. “I know,” he said, tugging Quentin back to get at his lips, kissing him softly. “You’re like a dream, sweetheart.”

Quentin shifted against him, his erection pressing into Eliot’s belly as he planted a kiss to his jaw. “Did you mean it when you said you wanted me to…” He paused to take a breath, meeting Eliot’s gaze. “You know… touch myself…”

“Only if you want to, baby,” Eliot purred, his pulse picking up a little, and he kissed Quentin’s forehead, the tip of his nose, the slope of his cheek.

“I want to,” Quentin said quickly, his skin like fire under Eliot’s hands. “Sometimes it’s just hard to…”

“To be seen like that.”

“Yeah.”

Eliot kissed the curve of Quentin’s neck, just to feel him shiver. “I have an idea,” he said, and with a flourish of his fingers the blinds slammed shut on the windows, folding them into the dark. “How’s that?”

“You can’t see me in the dark,” Quentin said, laughing against his shoulder.

“No. But I can hear you.” Eliot gently nudged Quentin out of his lap. “Come on, lie on your back, get comfortable.”

Eliot forced himself up to his feet, and Quentin let out a needy little whine. “Where are you going?”

Eliot smiled into the dark. “Just have to put up a silencing ward for… everyone’s sake. Margo—”

A laugh rolled out of Quentin’s chest. “Fuck. I didn’t even think about…”

“Yeah. Me neither. In my defense, you’re terribly distracting.”

Eliot lit the tiniest of illumination spells to help him navigate the room, warding each corner as quickly as he could manage, his magic flowing through him like water. When he was finished he snuffed out the spell and all but dove back onto the bed, feeling his way over to Quentin. In the dark he could just make out the shape of his body, a silver shadow fluttering in the blackness, warm and thrumming under Eliot’s touch. Quentin was on his back, legs parted, knees bent. Eliot trailed a hand up to Quentin’s thigh, his own cock growing thicker inside his pants. 

“Where are your hands right now?”

“Beside me,” Quentin breathed.

“Good. Keep them there for now. Let me get you nice and wet.”

Eliot did a tut, feeling the cleaning spell take hold of Quentin’s body and lift away. Quentin arched up into his touch when Eliot took his cock in hand, moaning as though he’d never been touched before. Eliot shut his eyes, letting his senses guide him, taking Quentin into his mouth and sinking down, down…

Quentin gasped and gripped his hair, babbling nonsense as Eliot took him to the root, holding himself down, reveling in the fullness, only pulling back when he needed to catch his breath. He took him down again, and a third time, choking himself on Quentin’s length, smiling when he finally pulled away.

“There,” he said, panting, smiling, feeling so alive. “How’s that feel, sweetheart?”

“Good. So… good.” Quentin moaned, and Eliot could feel it coiling around him, the embrace of his pleasure shivering in the dark.

“Mmm, that’s what I like to hear.” He teased his fingers along the sensitive flesh of Quentin’s inner thigh. “Now wrap your hand around your dick. Can you do that for me, my love?”

“Yes.”

The first thing he registered was the slick sound of Quentin’s hand moving over his cock. Grasping at the shadows, Eliot swore he could almost see it. The shape of Quentin’s head on the pillow, the gentle outline of his body moving on the bed. The sound of Quentin’s breathing hit him next, desperate little puffs of air punctuated with gasps and broken moans, the mattress creaking steadily beneath him. Eliot touched the curve of his knee just to feel him shaking.

“Is this okay?” Quentin asked, his voice more ruined than Eliot thought he’d ever heard it, the sound of it going straight to his dick.

“It’s perfect, baby. You’re so good for me.”

“Wanna…” Quentin let a guttural moan slip out of his chest and, fuck, it was the best thing Eliot’s ears had ever heard. “Wanna be good for you.” Everything was like music then: the creaking of the bed, the filthy, gorgeous sounds of Quentin’s hand working over his dick, Eliot’s blood pounding so hard.

Eliot sat back on his heels, forcing himself to breathe, letting his eyes slide shut. _This is real,_ he repeated to himself like a mantra, centering himself in his body, focusing on the movement of his own hands against his thighs. If he’d been in agony when Quentin was gone, this was the polar opposite, a blissful reward he couldn’t be entirely certain he deserved. Something that seemed like it should be for someone else, someone better. Each sound that slipped from Quentin’s chest was like a balm to his heart, and Eliot felt drunk with it. Quentin moaned out something that sounded like his name and his cock ached painfully down between his legs. If he touched himself now it would be all over, and oh, how Eliot desperately wanted it to last.

“I want you,” Quentin breathed, his body going still on the bed. “Want you to… to see me.”

The ache spread itself up to Eliot’s chest, and he opened his eyes. “Are you sure?”

“Yes. But just…” Quentin laughed softly. “Not too bright.”

Eliot smiled, giving Quentin’s knee a little squeeze. “I’ve got you, sweetheart,” he said, then began casting a dim illumination spell above their heads.

The glow it cast was shallow and tinged a coppery hue, painting Quentin the color of a washed out sunset. He lay there shivering, his eyes meeting Eliot’s in the dim light, one hand wrapped loosely around his dick, the other bunching up the covers at his side.

“Oh, Q,” Eliot said, breathless at the sight before him. “You’re beautiful.”

Quentin reached for him across the short distance. “Come here,” he breathed. “El. Please.”

Eliot took his hand, bringing the back of it to his lips and kissing each knuckle gently. “Hey,” he said, smiling, brushing the hair back from Quentin’s brow.

“Hey.” Quentin leaned into the touch, the hand he had wrapped around himself starting to move. “I’m close…”

“Good,” Eliot purred. “That’s it. Make yourself come for me, Q.”

Eliot’s hand slid down the slope of Quentin’s cheek to his neck, his collarbone, tracing circles into his chest and back again. He touched the curve of his throat, feeling the frantic thumping of his pulse, his eyes locked on Quentin’s face, the way his mouth fell open as he chased his pleasure.

“El,” Quentin moaned, holding Eliot’s name like a prayer on his tongue. “I’m gonna come.”

“Oh, yes baby, that’s it.” Eliot pulled away, his own cock throbbing in time with his heart between his legs. “I wanna taste you. Will you come in my mouth?”

Quentin arched up off the bed, his body drawing tight. “Yes,” he choked out, and then laughed. “Hurry. I don’t know how long I can—”

Quentin was already coming when Eliot sealed his lips around the head of his cock, sobbing and gripping Eliot’s hair, fucking up into the heat of his mouth, spurting all over his tongue. He slipped into Eliot’s throat, and Eliot took him down deep, his cock still quivering with aftershocks as his body went slack on the bed. It was only when he went soft that Eliot let himself come up for air, swallowing down the taste of him with a contented sigh.

Laughing, aching, gasping for breath, Eliot collapsed back against the headboard, and Quentin rolled over into his lap, nosing lazily up the line of his cock where it was trapped beneath his pants. He mouthed at it hungrily, wetting the fabric with his tongue, his body still trembling with the afterglow of his release.

“Fuck my mouth,” Quentin purred, looking up at Eliot with his dark eyes.

Eliot carded fingers through Quentin’s sweat-damp hair. “I wanna… save this one,” he said, so hard it made him dizzy. “Just for a little while. Is that okay?”

“So you can fuck me?” The way Quentin said the words, it was like some holy thing.

“Yes baby.” He stroked a hand down Quentin’s face. “You still wanna ride my dick?”

“Yes.” 

Eliot felt the word shudder through his body, Quentin’s hot mouth panting against the hard line of his erection, and it was all he could do to not give into his animal brain and let Quentin have his way right then. “Think you can get hard again?”

“I don’t know.” Quentin laughed. “I can try.”

Eliot smiled lazily, letting his eyes fall shut. “Take a shower with me.”

Quentin settled heavily against his thigh. “Okay,” he said, neither of them making any effort to actually move.

Minutes passed or maybe an hour. Finally, Quentin pulled away, stumbling out of bed and over to the bathroom. Eliot watched him with an easy smile, drinking in the sight of his bare skin, extinguishing the illumination spell overhead and opening the blinds halfway with a flick of his wrist.

Eliot followed him into the bathroom, stripping off his pants as Quentin turned on the water. The ache of his erection had faded away, but arousal still thrummed heavily under his skin at the sight of Quentin stepping into the shower. But there was no need to rush. Eliot only wanted to be close. He stepped in after Quentin and pulled him back against his chest, sucking gentle kisses along the slope of his neck. 

Quentin laughed, threading their fingers together. “This is nice.”

“Yeah.” _This is real._ “It is.”

Eventually, they parted. Eliot washed Quentin’s hair, knelt down laughing so that Quentin could wash his. They touched each other gently, they kissed under the spray. They stepped out with supple, steaming skin and toweled each other off. 

Quentin mussed up Eliot’s hair and snapped him gently with his towel, taking off into the bedroom with Eliot on his heels.

“You wanna go, Coldwater?” Eliot could hardly get the words out he was laughing so hard.

Quentin ducked down beside the bed out of sight, and Eliot tackled him to the floor, laughing against his neck, the two of them tussling for a moment before Quentin stole his mouth in a kiss.

“That’s cheating,” Eliot said when he broke away, trying to catch his breath.

Quentin hummed, shooting him a grin. “You love it.”

Eliot ran his fingers through Quentin’s wet hair, his eyes going all soft. “I love you.”

Quentin just stared at him for a moment, blinking, smiling softly, and he pressed a kiss to Eliot’s forehead before pulling away. They got to their feet and Quentin went to the dresser, rummaging around in the top drawer without so much as a word.

“What are you doing?” Eliot asked, knowing perfectly well what he’d left in there.

Quentin turned on his heels smiling, one of Eliot’s ties dangling from his fingers. “I don’t know,” he said, crossing the space between them. “What does it look like to you?”

“It looks like,” Eliot said, gazing deep into Quentin’s dark eyes, “you’re being a very clever boy.”

Quentin smirked, running the fabric of the tie through his hands, the line of his body relaxed, his expression confident and open. He snaked the tie around Eliot’s neck, gripping both ends and using it to tug him down. “You know what I wanna do with this?” he asked, smiling against Eliot’s lips.

“I think I have…” Eliot stole a fleeting kiss, and his heart began to pound. “A pretty good idea.”

A flash of vulnerability moved over Quentin’s face as he released his grip. “Is that okay?”

Eliot nodded. “Yes. But our headboard is a useless lump of tufted fabric at the moment so…”

Quentin laughed, sweeping the damp hair away from his brow. “Right. We’re gonna need to replace that… immediately.”

“Tomorrow.”

“Good idea.” Quentin sighed. “For now I guess we’ll just… have to get creative.”

Eliot grinned. “Daddy likes the sound of that.”

Quentin snatched the tie from his neck and used it to swat him on the hip. “Just go get on the bed.”

Eliot sprawled out on the mattress with a smile, and Quentin knelt at his side, considering the length of his body carefully. He ran the pad of one finger up the length of Eliot’s soft cock where it rested against his hip. “Put your hands above your head,” he said, a little breathless, blushing high up on his cheeks.

Eliot stretched out languidly at his command, reveling in the way that it felt to have Quentin’s eyes raking over his skin, crossing his wrists and waiting for him to make his move. And for a moment, Quentin was perfectly still, the tie held loosely in his hand.

“Could you, uh…” Quentin’s words came out all broken, like he was starting to lose his nerve. “Tie yourself… and uh—”

“Hey.” Eliot gave him a soft look. “It’s just you and me, Q.”

“I know. I…”

“Breathe for me, baby.”

“I am.”

“You want me to shut the blinds again?”

“No.” Quentin shook his head, curving a hand around Eliot’s ribcage. “I wanna see you.”

“Okay.” Eliot resisted the urge to reach for him. “We’ll take it slow. Do you want me to tie my wrists?”

Quentin nodded, and Eliot didn’t waste a second, lifting the tie from his hand with ease. If he focused, he hardly had to move his fingers at all, but a single loose knot was all he could manage before his mental hold on the fabric slipped away.

“Good?” he asked, watching Quentin’s intense focus shift from his wrists to his face.

“Yeah. Will you… keep them there until I say?”

“You know I will, my love.” Eliot tested the knot with a little tug of his wrists, found it tight enough to hold. “You wanna get me hard now?”

“Yeah…” Quentin ran his fingers along the rigid line of Eliot’s scar. “Do you want my mouth?”

“I always want your mouth.” Eliot arched up into his touch. “But your hand is good too.”

Quentin nodded, pulling the bottle of lube out from where it was half-tucked under a pillow. 

“Are you with me, baby?” Eliot asked, watching him snap the bottle open.

“I’m here,” Quentin said, his gaze fixed on the pool streaming down into his palm.

“Look at me,” Eliot said, and Quentin raised his eyes. “Hey. Tell me what you’re thinking.”

Quentin shook his head. “That none of this feels real.”

Eliot ached hard down under his ribs. “It’s real, Q. I’m here. So are you.”

“I know. It’s just...”

“Just stay in the moment with me, okay? Tell me what you’re doing.”

His lips twitched with the promise of a smile. “You know what I’m doing.”

“I know. But I want you to tell me.”

“I’m… gonna stroke you.” He pulled in a shuddering breath and let it out. “Gonna get you hard.”

Eliot hummed, shifting his body on the bed. “I like the sound of that. Then what are you gonna do?”

Quentin’s face flushed a deep shade of scarlet. “I’m gonna ride your dick.”

“Yeah you are,” Eliot purred, and he could feel his body growing hot. “How does that make you feel?”

“Uh… excited.”

“Why?”

Quentin whined. “El…”

“Touch my dick, baby. Talk to me.”

“Okay.” Quentin swallowed, wrapping his hand around Eliot’s half-hard length. “I’m excited because… it feels good.”

Eliot arched up into his touch, slick and tight and perfect. “Tell me why it feels good.”

“It’s…” Quentin kept his eyes firmly locked on his hand working up and down, Eliot’s cock growing harder by the second. “It’s big. It’s really big. The biggest I’ve ever had. Or seen. And I like… the way it fills me up.”

“Yeah…” Eliot bucked his hips, fucking up into the tightness of Quentin’s fist, knowing he could probably come in ten seconds flat just from this if he allowed himself to lose control. “Gonna bounce on my big dick with that pretty ass?”

Quentin took his bottom lip between his teeth, nodding, meeting Eliot’s gaze with lust-blown eyes. “Yeah. El…”

“That’s it. Fuck, Q, that’s so good.” Eliot let a little whimper slip out of his throat. “You getting hard again for me too?”

“Yes.” Quentin stilled his hand, thumbing at the pre-come dripping from Eliot’s slit. “Yeah, El, I am…”

“Good.” Eliot ached at the loss when Quentin pulled his hand away. “I’d offer to do the spell on you but,” he laughed, tugging at his binds.

“It’s okay,” Quentin said, straddling his thighs. “I can feel you more without it.”

Eliot watched in awe as Quentin slicked his fingers, reaching back and working them into his body, his lips falling open as the room filled with the ragged sound of his breathing. He rode the length of them for a moment, almost mechanically, wasting no time once he’d pulled them free, straddling Eliot’s hips and reaching back to line him up.

“Hey.” Eliot reveled in being at his mercy, but desperately ached to hold him. “There’s no rush, baby. Take your time.”

Quentin pushed down until the head of Eliot’s cock began slipping into his body. “I don’t wanna take my time,” he groaned.

“Baby,” Eliot croaked, willing his hips to stay still, aching to fuck up into the tight heat that surrounded him. “I don’t want you to hurt yourself. Hey…”

“El…” Quentin pulled up a little and then sank back down, taking Eliot deeper by an inch or two. “I need it…”

“Sweetheart. Look at me.” Quentin met his gaze, thighs trembling and mouth slack, tears welling in his eyes. “Those memories didn’t happen to this body, my love. It’s been… a long time since I was last inside you.”

With a whimper, Quentin lifted up and let Eliot fall away. 

“Hey,” Eliot said, bunching his bound hands into fists. “You sure you don’t want the spell? Or my fingers?”

“I want you just like this,” Quentin said without hesitation, reaching for the lube.

“Okay. That’s good. Get my dick nice and wet.”

Quentin slicked him until he was dripping with it, stroking Eliot’s length with his bottom lip caught between his teeth, his eyes sparking in the filtered light coming in through the blinds.

“That’s it, Q. Fuck, you’re so gorgeous like this. I can taste how badly you want it.” Eliot rolled his hips, fucking up into Quentin’s hand. “And I wanna… wanna give it to you good.”

Quentin pulled his hand away, began bouncing on the length of his fingers again, repeating, “I need it, I need it, I need it,” like a prayer, consecrating Eliot’s name on his lips as he writhed. When he moved up to straddle Eliot this time, it was with renewed purpose in his eyes. “I’ll go slow,” he said, “I promise,” and Eliot couldn’t dream of denying him.

_I’d give you anything,_ he thought, watching Quentin lining himself up slowly, _anything at all,_ his whole body quaking with desire and love. Quentin braced his hands on Eliot’s chest, sinking down on the head of his dick, giving himself a little more with a gentle rolling of his hips.

“Baby, baby,” Eliot purred, feeling Quentin all around him, everywhere, “tell me how it feels.”

Quentin moaned with the full force of his chest, taking half of Eliot’s length before going still. “Like a dream,” he breathed. “Like I’m… I’m dreaming…”

“You’re not dreaming, Q. You’re here with me. Look in my eyes.” Eliot gasped as Quentin sank down further, pulling back just a little before seating himself completely in his lap. “Fuck. Oh, baby. It’s so deep. Look at me. Talk to me.”

Quentin struggled to focus, and Eliot could feel the desire spilling from him in thick waves as he met his eyes. “Fill me up,” he moaned, as though he had to wrench the words from somewhere hidden and dark. “Come inside me, El.”

Quentin’s swollen cock leaked down onto Eliot’s belly as he rocked his hips, and Eliot tugged at his binds, arching up to meet Quentin’s rhythm, gently, fighting his primal urge to fuck into him at a relentless pace. 

“Take what you need first. Come for me again, Q. I know you can.”

“El. El,” Quentin whined. “I can’t, I can’t, I…”

“Yes you can, baby. You feel so good on my dick. You’re beautiful, you’re so beautiful.” Distantly, Eliot was aware that he was babbling, his head spinning and his balls drawing so fucking tight, every nerve in his body screaming in the shape of Quentin’s name.

“Fuck me,” Quentin huffed, his body going still, bracing himself firmly against Eliot’s chest, gazing down into his eyes. “Do it hard.”

“Darling,” Eliot said, practically begging, snapping his hips once, crying out, pulling back just to do it all over again. “Let me get my hands on you.”

“No,” Quentin breathed. “Just like this. I want you… just like this…”

“I’d give you anything.” Eliot punctuated his words by rocking up into him, working up a gentle, steady rhythm. “Anything, anything my love.”

“Give it to me.” Dripping sweat, quivering, his damp hair covering his eyes, Eliot could see Quentin melting away, becoming something else. “Baby, baby, baby,” he babbled. “Give it to me hard.”

Eliot felt the time slowing around them, his focus narrowing down to a single point. Every muscle drawing tight, he growled, letting his body speak the truest language of his heart. His hips worked on instinct then, thrusting up into Quentin, reveling in his sobs, the aching promise of yet another orgasm rising in his blood.

“Come on my dick,” Eliot commanded, voice thick and dark. “Is this what you wanted, baby? Daddy fucking you hard and deep?”

“Yes,” Quentin cried, sweat dripping from his brow and onto Eliot’s chest. “I can’t. El… I—I don’t know if I can…”

“Yes you can.” The bed screamed beneath him as Quentin sobbed above. “I’m so close, sweetheart. Your body is so warm. Come with me, baby, please.”

Eliot experienced everything that came next in a wave of blissful slow motion: Quentin collapsing against his chest with a sob, crying into the hollow of his throat, the warmth of his cock spurting where it was trapped between their bodies, his own orgasm wrenching itself out from somewhere deep, and it took him a moment to register that they’d actually begun to lift up from the bed, hovering several inches above the mattress with the force of the magic that flowed between them.

His hips stuttered as his pleasure rolled from his body and into Quentin. Their sobs, their breathing, it all came together in a symphony as they drifted steadily up and up, flying toward the ceiling as Quentin’s hands and lips set fire to his skin. But then, just like breathing out, the spell began to fizzle away, and they settled back down onto the bed softly, their bodies going slack.

Eliot shut his eyes, and after a moment he was vaguely aware of Quentin fumbling with the knot at his wrists, and that the tie was being pulled away, and that his arms were falling down to wrap their bodies together. The world had gone all fuzzy at the edges, and Eliot only came back to reality when he realized that Quentin had begun sobbing quietly against his neck. 

“Hey, hey,” he slurred, shifting them onto their sides, cradling Quentin’s head and letting him fall apart. “Sweetheart. Oh, my love. I’ve got you. Everything’s all right now.”

Quentin lifted his damp face, meeting Eliot’s eyes. “This is real, isn’t it? This is life…”

“Yes.” Eliot gasped, feeling mended, whole, complete. “This is our life together.”

Lips trembling, fresh tears spilling without end, Quentin smiled, tucking his face back into the hollow of Eliot’s throat. And Eliot could only sigh, and let his own tears come, and fold Quentin more completely in his arms.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Only one more chapter to go y'all, and I'm pretty emotional about it. Until next Friday. <3


	7. After

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Could you just look at me?” Eliot had to remind himself to breathe. “‘Cause if I’m being honest, Q, you’re really starting to freak me out.”

A week passed, and one morning at breakfast Alice said, “I’m going back to school.”

Quentin looked up from his half-eaten toast with a little smile and said, “That’s good.”

“Yes,” she said, looking between him and Eliot. “I mean, I might as well graduate while I’m trying to figure out… whatever the hell it is I’m supposed to be doing.”

Eliot nodded. “I’m happy for you, Alice,” he said, feeling suddenly lighter as he downed the last dregs of his coffee.

It had been an awkward week, the three of them dancing around one another in the penthouse’s common spaces, Eliot doing his best to keep Quentin from retreating into the solitude of his own mind. It had proven to be as much of a challenge as he’d expected, but he was happy every second of it. Genuinely, deeply, terrifyingly _happy,_ for perhaps the first time in his life.

“You know,” Alice said after a stretch of uncomfortable silence, “you two could go back to Brakebills if you wanted.”

Eliot huffed out a laugh, looking over to Quentin who was staring down at his plate with an expression that was hard to read. Two days ago, Margo had finally gone ahead to Fillory, and Eliot had promised they would meet her there soon. He could tell that Quentin was itching to leave, even if he wouldn’t say it. Eliot gave his shoulder a squeeze and pulled himself to his feet, carrying their empty mugs to the sink just to give himself something to do other than worry. 

Quentin left his half-finished toast on the table and crossed to the living room, falling down on the sofa and out of sight. Eliot finished washing the mugs, dried his hands, walked back over to the table. “I really am happy for you, you know,” he said.

“Thank you,” she said, her body language more open now that Quentin was a little farther away. “And I’m happy for… both of you. Even if this is the weirdest fucking situation I’ve ever been in, including all that time I was a niffin.”

Eliot laughed softly. “Yeah. It’s… yeah.”

Alice shrugged. “How’s he doing?”

“Better, I think. Mostly. He gets really quiet sometimes. Something else has been on his mind lately, I can tell, but I’m trying not to push.” Eliot sighed, a little pit of dread pooling in his belly. “He’s got a therapy appointment next week though, so…”

Alice gave him a genuine smile then, one that reached all the way to her eyes. “That’s a really good thing to hear,” she said, but then her face fell almost at once, and Eliot could see the sadness lurking underneath, and he understood that well.

They cleaned up the remnants of their breakfast and Eliot went to Quentin, found him curled up on a giant throw pillow flicking through his phone. Giving his leg a squeeze, Eliot perched beside him. “Hey.”

“Hey.” Quentin locked his phone and tossed it onto the coffee table, turning his tired face to Eliot. “Let’s go to Fillory tomorrow.”

Eliot smiled, leaning down to press a kiss to his forehead. “Sounds like a plan, my love.”

—

They left for Brakebills before the sun came up, walking through the clock in the Physical Kids’ Cottage and out through the portal tree to a shockingly blue Fillorian sky. Quentin was quiet on the short walk to Whitespire, fidgeting and distracted when Margo greeted them in the throne room.

“Everything all right?” Eliot asked, giving his hand a squeeze, trying his best to not give into the feeling that something was about to go terribly wrong.

“Yeah, I just… I need to go ask Fen… something.” Quentin pulled away, practically bouncing out of his shoes, mumbling over his shoulder, “I’ll be right back.”

Hands on her hips, Margo shot Eliot a look. “What the hell is that about?”

Eliot shrugged, his insides turning into a mass of knots against his will. “He’s been acting weird all morning. Actually, make that all week.”

“Has there ever been a week Coldwater wasn’t acting weird?”

Eliot sighed. “Bambi…”

She smiled, linking their arms together. “Don’t look at me like that. We love your weird little lover man.”

Eliot forced a little smile. “You’re damn right we do.”

Quentin and Fen stood half-obscured in shadow in a far corner of the room, talking in hushed voices, their expressions hard to read. Eliot watched as she broke away from him after a moment, walked over to her throne, raising her head regally before clapping her hands, drawing the attention of everyone else in the room.

“Okay, everyone out!” she shouted with a smile, giving a little flourish of her hands. “That means you, Tick. And you… guards.” She trained her eyes on Margo next. “And you. Not you, Eliot. And… Quentin has to stay. Everyone else… it’s a big castle. Find some place to go that isn’t here.”

Margo gave Eliot a questioning look, and he shrugged, his heart taking flight in his chest. She let go of his arm and pulled away, and Eliot turned his attention to Quentin across the room, his whole body a terrible mess of nerves. Everyone filed out, High King Fen included, shutting the door behind her, leaving Quentin and Eliot there alone. Worrying his hands together, Quentin sat down on the step that led up to the throne, and Eliot went to him at once, kneeling at his feet.

“Q.” Eliot touched his knee and Quentin flinched. “Baby. Hey.’

Quentin let out a shuddering breath, staring down at his hands. “Hi.”

“Could you just look at me?” Eliot had to remind himself to breathe. “‘Cause if I’m being honest, Q, you’re really starting to freak me out.”

When Quentin raised his eyes they were damp, and Eliot could already feel the cracks forming in his heart. That terrible, impossible fucking dread rising like bile in this throat to pull him under. “I’m just, uh… trying to work up the nerve to… say what I need to say.”

Eliot snatched his hand away. “Just spit it out,” he said, way harsher than was probably necessary, but he couldn’t actually help it. If he had to wait just one more second for the words to come out of Quentin’s mouth, he was going to explode out of his skin.

Quentin frowned at him. “El,” was all he said, but he sounded so broken that Eliot… Eliot just fucking shattered.

Allowing the pit of dread to swallow him whole, Eliot pulled himself to his feet and turned away, feeling like the biggest fool to ever live on Earth or Fillory. He should have known better than to let himself believe he could have something so beautiful and keep it. He should have known better than to want in this way, and to hope. To believe that Quentin could ever—

“Eliot,” Quentin said firmly at his back. “Please don’t make this—”

“This is why you’ve been acting so weird,” Eliot said, his voice quavering with the promise of tears as he turned around. “But why does it have to be here?”

Quentin struggled to his feet. “El, you’re not—”

Eliot choked out a bitter laugh, a single tear spilling down his cheek. “Is this… oh my god. Are you trying to get back at me for… what I did?” Quentin closed the space between them quickly, reaching out a hand, but Eliot pulled away. “I know it’s only been a week, but you couldn’t just—”

“El...”

“You couldn’t—”

“Eliot!” Quentin was shouting now, a fire burning in his eyes, and Eliot could feel the whole of Fillory tipping under his feet, his vision going all fuzzy at the edges. 

“If you’re going to break up with me just fucking do it already!”

Quentin threw his hands in the air with a heavy sigh. “Oh my god.”

“Just fucking—”

“Jesus fuck, Eliot, I’m trying to ask you to marry me!”

Oh. 

_Oh._

The room went quiet and very still, every stitch of air punching itself from Eliot’s lungs all at once. And for a moment, they could only stare at each other, wide-eyed and unblinking, lips parted as though to speak, but the words refusing to come.

And then slowly, Quentin moved his body forward, catching Eliot by the wrist gently, giving it a little tug. “I think maybe you should… come sit down with me.”

Eliot allowed himself to be led over to the step, all but collapsing down onto it, feeling entirely apart from himself, like he’d literally left his body, like his limbs had turned to water and couldn’t hold onto him anymore. His mind had dissolved itself into nothing but air, his blood pounding in his ears so loudly it drowned out the rest of the world.

Quentin knelt at Eliot’s feet, a little blurry through the tears clouding Eliot’s vision. “Okay, so…” He laughed nervously, wiping at his eyes. “I don’t know how to start over now that I’ve...”

“It’s okay,” Eliot heard his own voice say, somewhere distant, somewhere beyond the thumping of his pulse. 

Quentin nodded. “So I… have all these memories, right?” He took a breath, exhaling slowly, worrying his hands into knots in his lap. “Months and years and… decades. An entire life that didn’t happen.”

“It happened,” Eliot said, the words rolling out of him on instinct.

“You know what I mean.” Quentin tucked a short tuft of hair back behind his ear, and a lump caught in Eliot’s throat. “But in all those memories… after Arielle was gone, and Teddy had grown up and left home. All that time, I never asked you—” Quentin took a breath. “You were my husband, in every way that could ever count, but I… I never asked you.”

“Q…” Eliot reached out, a sob catching in his chest, and he touched Quentin’s face gently, thumbing at a tear as it slipped warmly down his cheek.

“I don’t know why I didn’t ask,” Quentin said through his tears, his lips quivering terribly.

“It’s okay.” Eliot pulled his hand away slowly. “It doesn’t—”

“It matters.” Quentin wiped at his face, reaching down into his pocket and pulling out a little box, a chunky thing covered in black velvet and unmistakable in its shape. “It matters to me. So I… I went out and… I got this, and…”

Eliot was pretty sure his heart had stopped, yet somehow he continued to breathe. “When did you...”

“The day after… that first time.” Quentin laughed when Eliot shot him a look. “I know. I don’t know what I was thinking, I… I don’t know that I was thinking. But then I… hid it away, and I couldn’t stop thinking about it, and then it hit me that…”

“Sweetheart,” Eliot breathed, watching it all in slow motion as Quentin opened the little box and pulled a thin silver band from inside.

He worried the ring between his thumb and forefinger, meeting Eliot’s gaze head-on. “The only thing I’ve ever wanted more than magic is you.”

All at once, just as Eliot felt his heart jolting back to life, every old fear he’d ever had bubbled to the surface, threatening to pull him under. Struggling for air, he bunched his hands into tight fists in his lap, and Quentin was on him in an instant, leaning up to stroke his face, pressing gentle kisses in the wake of his fingers.

“You still with me?” he breathed.

Eliot nodded, pulling air deep into his lungs, letting it out as slowly as he could manage. “Would you just, uh… put the ring on my finger already.”

Quentin laughed, thumbing the tears from Eliot’s cheek. “I haven’t even asked—”

“My answer is fucking yes.” Eliot was certain he was going to burst out of his skin. His heart was going to explode this time. He was actually for real going to die. “Please just do it before I—”

“Okay, okay.” Quentin pulled back, taking Eliot’s trembling hand in his own, slipping on the silver band and finding it just a hair too big for his finger.

Their eyes met, and Quentin smiled, wiggling his fingers a little over the spot where he’d just placed the ring, and Eliot felt the metal of the band tightening at once.

“There,” Quentin said. “Perfect fit.”

Eliot stared down at the ring, tears blurring it in his vision, watching the metal glint in the light. He took a breath, raising his eyes to Quentin as he let it out. “You couldn’t even get me a diamond, Coldwater?”

Quentin barked out a laugh, climbing into his lap and stealing Eliot’s lips in a kiss, licking into his mouth with an aching hunger. They kissed until they were breathless, and Quentin broke away, knocking their foreheads together with a smile. “Tell me how you feel.”

“Like you’re the most terrifying thing to ever happen to me.”

Quentin grinned, nuzzling into him, stroking a hand along the nape of his neck. “You’re braver than you know.”

Eliot could only kiss him breathless again, and let Quentin pull him unsteadily to his feet, laughing, tears still falling from their eyes.

“You know what I wanna do now?” Quentin said, pulling Eliot in by the front of his shirt.

Gripping Quentin’s shoulders to keep himself steady, the room seeming to spin all around them, Eliot smiled. “Do tell.”

“Well…” Quentin’s voice dropped low, a look growing in his eyes that Eliot knew well. “I was thinking that my High King might like to sit on his throne and allow me… to serve him.”

Eliot’s eyes went wide, and he couldn’t help but laugh, pulling Quentin into his arms. “Quentin Coldwater, you are a filthy boy.” He watched as a blush crept its way up Quentin’s cheeks, falling impossibly deeper in love by the second. “And I am all for incorporating some kinky royal roleplay into our sex life if that’s what you want, but I think my ex-wife might actually kill me if I put my bare ass on her throne.”

Quentin considered him for a moment, then leaned up and pecked him on the lips. “Okay. But I’m holding you to the role play thing.”

Eliot watched him fondly as he pulled away. “Your High King would never dream of denying his betrothed a single thing his heart desires.”

He looked down at the ring on his finger, back up to Quentin where he stood fidgeting with the hem of his shirt, watching a thousand unspoken conversations unravel behind his eyes. “So, speaking of,” he said, a familiar uncertainty returning to his voice. “There’s… something else that I, uh... wanted to ask you.”

“Name it,” Eliot said, reaching across the space between them with upturned hands, “and it’s yours.”

“Okay.” Quentin ran a hand through his hair, huffing out a nervous laugh. “What would you say about… going to the mosaic.”

Eliot ached, hard, from his heart down to his toes. “I’d say it’s probably not there anymore, but…” When Quentin began to frown, Eliot quickly crossed the space between them, taking his face between his hands. “Of course we can go, sweetheart.”

Quentin nodded, a little smile tugging at his lips. “Thank you.”

—

Eliot had missed the Southern Orchard. He’d visited far too infrequently in all his time wearing the crown. Nearly every memory he had of this place was from another life: the taste of peaches sweet on his tongue, bunches of wildflowers spilling from his hands, the scent of the air making him dizzy, Teddy’s little voice calling from somewhere beyond.

“We should have taken Fen’s horses,” Quentin groaned, trudging through a tangle of underbrush, the sun dappling golden patterns on his skin and making him shine. “Or the hippogriffs.”

Eliot smiled. “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but… the walk is actually nice.” He reached over, threading their fingers together. “And anyway, I think we’re almost there.”

They walked hand-in-hand for another minute or two, and then the clearing seemed to snatch the forest away without warning, the sight of the cottage suddenly before them enough to knock the air from Eliot’s lungs. 

He looked to Quentin, giving his hand a squeeze. “Okay so… still here. Sort of…”

“Shit,” Quentin breathed.

Strangled by vines on a mostly barren plot, every window in the cottage had been busted out, a not insignificant portion of its roof entirely gone, the spot that had once been reserved for the puzzle now nothing more than an overgrown hump of earth dotted with shaggy grass. There was no awning over the door, no flower boxes under the windows, no food growing in the garden, no birdhouse made by their own hands, not a single sign at all of the quiet life their love had made.

“Well,” Quentin said with a sigh, “you wanna… go inside?”

Eliot turned to him, taking Quentin’s face between his hands. “Are you okay?”

Quentin nodded, eyes brimming with uncertainty. “I’m okay. I… knew it wouldn’t look how we remember, but… still feels… strange. Seeing it like this.”

“Yeah.” Eliot pressed a kiss to his brow. “Let’s go inside.”

They went to the door, which was all but rotting from its hinges. Quentin cast a mending spell, but when he turned the handle to push inside it snapped right off in his hand. Shoving at it with his shoulder, the door splintered down the middle under his weight, and he sighed hard, looking more than a little defeated. “Maybe this was a bad idea,” he said, with a longing in his eyes that made Eliot’s heart feel broken.

“No,” Eliot said gently, kissing the top of Quentin’s head. “We’ve got this, sweetheart. It’s okay.”

Quentin nodded, and gave him a smile, and with a little brute force and a whole lot of magic, Eliot got the rotting remnants of the door out of their way. “Home sweet home,” Eliot said, absently, stepping over the threshold to the dank and musty scent of a place long forgotten, left untouched by loving hands for years or decades. Breathing in, he nearly choked, and immediately began casting cleaning spells on the air.

Sunlight filtered in through the hole in the roof, the busted windows and door, hairline cracks in the walls, motes of dust dancing into oblivion as Eliot’s spells took hold. A latticework of cobwebs hung heavily in each corner of the tiny space, draping over the sparse furniture like a delicate lace. 

Eliot stood near the ancient wood burning stove in the back corner, watching distant trees swaying through the window beyond. If he shut his eyes, he could almost imagine the shape of their home coming together around them, the scent of bread burning in the fire, the patter of tiny feet against the bare wooden floor. Behind him, the sounds of Quentin’s exploration pulled him back. His breath, his fingers dragging along the tops of rotting shelves, the ancient dining table, the clink of something metal clattering to the floor.

And then it all went silent. Outside, the wind seemed to choke itself away with a gasp. Eliot held his hand up to a golden beam of sun, watched the thin band of metal Quentin had placed there sparkle and shine, and his lips upturned in a smile.

“You were making tea,” Quentin’s voice washed over him from behind.

Eliot turned his body slowly. “What?”

“Right there.” Quentin’s eyes met his in the soft light. “You were standing there, and you were making tea.”

“Come here,” Eliot said, reaching across the distance, pulling Quentin into his arms, back-to-chest, when he came near.

They swayed a little, staring out the open window as the breeze started kicking up again. “That herbal stuff that I hated,” Quentin said fondly, and Eliot desperately searched his own memory for the day he was recalling. “Teddy was outside. He was… fourteen? Fifteen maybe. Anyway, he was out in the forest gathering fruit. Or so he’d said…”

Eliot laughed. “He was smoking that disgusting stuff that was definitely not tobacco from that little shop in town.”

“Yeah. Yeah, every time…” 

Quentin fell silent, and Eliot kissed the top of his head, pulling him closer. “Go on. Tell me what happened next.”

“I was watching you. Your shoulders, the… the line of your neck. The gray hairs coming in at your temples.”

“Watch it.” Eliot smiled into his hair.

“You were beautiful. You are. Your hands… I couldn’t stop watching your hands.”

Eliot leaned down, nosing up the side of Quentin’s neck. “What about my hands?”

“Everything. How strong they were, your fingers… all the things that they could do to me. How lucky I was to…”

Quentin fell silent again, and Eliot spun him around, stealing his mouth in a kiss. “Sorry.” he said, breaking away, panting against his lips. “Hard to resist…”

Quentin smiled and pulled back, running his hands up along the curve of Eliot’s neck. “I think if I… were ever going to ask you to marry me, in that life… it would have been that day.”

“Q…”

Eyes shining, Quentin leaned up and slotted their mouths together, his fingers tangling in Eliot’s hair. It was a languid kiss, deep and aching, and Eliot drew Quentin in until their bodies were pressed tightly together from shoulder-to-hip, his fingers hungry for flesh wherever they might find it.

“I wanna use my mouth on you,” Quentin said when they parted, punctuating his words with a peck to Eliot’s cheek.

“Oh...” Eliot purred, smiling, thumbing at Quentin’s bottom lip. “My insatiable little cocksucker.”

“No.” Quentin laughed against his neck. “Not… well, yeah I want your cock too, but…”

Eliot’s pulse began to flutter at the implication. “Oh…”

“Yeah.” He nosed up along Eliot’s jaw, over to his ear, whispering, “I wanna eat you out.”

Eliot laughed, the first hints of arousal sparking between his legs. “Here? Q, as much as I appreciate having your tongue in my ass, I—”

“No, look…” Quentin pulled back, tugging Eliot by his wrist to the far side of the cottage. “The bed is still solid, I think it just needs to be cleaned.”

Eliot’s breath slipping away, his eyes took in the sight stretching out before him. The patchwork quilt was there on the bed, exactly where it had been found in that other life, covered in dust and stained with age but otherwise perfectly intact. He ran his hand along the fabric, starting to breathe again. 

Quentin wrapped his arms around Eliot from behind, pressing his face in between his shoulders. “So… what do you think?”

Eliot turned himself in Quentin’s arms, running a hand along his nape, gazing deep into his eyes. “I think you should probably start helping me with these cleaning spells so you can have your way with me.”

Quentin grinned, planting a peck on Eliot’s lips before slipping from his arms. He took one half of the bed and Eliot took the other, and they cast until their fingers ached, years of dirt and dust and filth lifting away and dissipating before their eyes. Eliot cleaned the patch of floor that surrounded the bed, shoving back twigs and leaves and splinters with gentle flicks of his hands, and didn’t stop until he could at least feel safe slipping out of his shoes, peeling off his socks and kicking them away.

“Magic is… really fucking cool,” Quentin said with a laugh.

“Yeah.” Eliot said. “It really fucking is.”

“So…” Quentin gave the front of Eliot’s shirt a playful tug. “Think that’s clean enough now for your delicate ass, your majesty?”

Eliot considered him with a smirk. “A throne fit for a king,” he said, watching as Quentin’s greedy fingers started popping the buttons open on his shirt. “So impatient. Did we not go over how horribly rude it is to touch a king without his permission?”

Quentin smiled up at him with dark eyes, a blush creeping over his cheeks. “I guess you’ll just have to punish me.”

He got Eliot’s shirt open and tore it away, tossing it onto the bed, practically pouncing on him to get at his skin. He sucked kisses all along Eliot’s collarbone until his cock was aching and his hands were clawing at the back of Quentin’s shirt.

“Take these off,” Quentin whined, tugging at Eliot’s belt.

“Baby,” Eliot laughed softly. “Patience. How about you take off your shirt and let me feel your skin?”

“Fine,” Quentin sighed, and Eliot shot him a grin.

“Pants too.”

“Now who’s the impatient one,” Quentin teased, his fingers already fumbling with the buttons of his shirt.

Eliot took off his belt, shoved his pants and underwear down and kicked them away. Quentin’s hands stilled on the buckle of his own belt, his bottom lip caught between his teeth, eyes fixed firmly on Eliot’s hard cock between his legs.

“Dirty boy,” Eliot purred, laughing, wrapping his hand around his length loosely and giving it a languid stroke. “You want this… take off your pants.”

Quentin raised his eyes, blushing deeper, stepping forward to steady himself on Eliot’s arm as he kicked out of his shoes and socks, laughing as he shoved his pants and underwear off and away. Their bodies folded together on instinct the moment they were both bare, moaning into each other’s mouths and tumbling down onto the bed.

Eliot settled between Quentin’s legs, sucking kisses into his throat, their erections sliding together in the space between their bodies. “Just one more thing, I think,” he said, forcing himself to pull away, sitting back on his heels.

“El,” Quentin whined, reaching for him across the distance. “You’re so warm. Don’t go.”

“I’m right here baby,” Eliot said with a smile. “I just wanna make sure everything is nice and ready for that pretty mouth.”

Eliot let his magic flow, casting with easy fingers from his head right down between his legs, up between his cheeks, cleaning himself everywhere. He did the same to Quentin, watching him laugh, gasping a little when the spell slipped around to his backside.

“Just in case,” Eliot said with a smirk, settling back down between Quentin’s parted thighs. “It was a long walk from Whitespire after all.”

“I appreciate it.” Quentin smiled, letting a contented moan slip from his mouth when Eliot kissed him deeply.

They rutted together unhurriedly, as though they had all the time in the world, and all at once it occurred to Eliot that they did. The rest of the day, the rest of their lives. Another lifetime together, until it was time for the next. It was enough to make tears well in his eyes, and he buried his face in Quentin’s neck, did his best to choke back the swell of emotion.

“Turn over,” Quentin breathed, hands slipping up and down Eliot’s back. “Let me get my mouth on you.”

Eliot shuddered, letting Quentin move him onto his back and straddle his thighs. Gazing down, hair falling in wisps into his eyes, Quentin was radiant, stray beams of sunshine slipping through the window at his back, setting his skin ablaze. He smiled softly, bending his body in two, sucking a kiss into Eliot’s throat, trailing a line down to his collarbone, across his chest, swiping at his nipples with his tongue. Eliot felt paralyzed with desire and love as Quentin slipped his way down lower, planting kisses along his belly, down past his navel, nipping playfully at the jut of his hips.

He swiped his tongue through the pre-come that had pooled where Eliot’s cock lay leaking against his skin, looking up with a smirk. “I love the way you taste,” he breathed, and Eliot could only reach for him, gripping his hair loosely as Quentin took him into his mouth.

Quentin lavished the head of his cock with his tongue, took Eliot down until he gagged and pulled back to nuzzle into him, giving him a few languid strokes. “Spread your legs, El,” he whispered, pulling away, settling in between his knees when Eliot opened to him without a sound.

He ran his fingers teasingly up the backs of Eliot’s thighs. “You’re quiet. Is everything all right?”

“Everything is perfect,” Eliot said, and meant it, perhaps more than he’d ever meant anything in his life. “A little… overwhelmed.”

A smile tugged at Quentin’s lips. “Yeah?”

“Yeah. By you, by… being here. In this bed. On this quilt.” Eliot ran his hands along the patchwork fabric spread out beneath him. “Do you think you can just keep touching me?”

“I don’t ever want to stop touching you, El.” He pressed a kiss to the curve of Eliot’s knee. “Tasting you…” His lips moved to Eliot’s inner thigh, nosing a line back up to his cock, licking a stripe along the underside of his shaft and down again.

A broken moan slipped out of Eliot’s chest as Quentin lavished his balls, sucking them between his lips and nosing down below. He parted Eliot’s thighs a little more, licking along that sensitive strip of skin that made Eliot’s toes curl and his blood pump frantically down between his legs. He pulled his knees back to his chest and held himself open for Quentin, gasping at the first gentle swipe of his tongue against his hole. And Eliot knew he was going to come quickly today, already so on edge, already feeling like he might pop, filling to the brim with lust and love. 

Quentin gripped Eliot’s cheeks and spread him wide, licking a stripe up to his balls and back, moaning happily as he went. He kissed the curve of Eliot’s ass. “I love you,” he whispered, pressing a kiss to the other side. “I’m going to marry you.”

“Baby,” Eliot sobbed, letting himself fall apart, inside and out. “Lick me open and give me your dick.”

“No,” Quentin purred, nuzzling into the back of his thigh. Eliot could feel him smiling there. “I want you to come just like this. My tongue in your ass while I stroke you.”

Quentin gave Eliot his tongue again, sending waves of pleasure rippling through his body, slowly and then all at once, until he was dizzy with it, jolts of desire traveling straight to his dick, all the way down to his toes. The breeze fluttered in through the windows, a gentle caress against Eliot’s bare skin, mixing with the sound of Quentin’s tongue working in a symphony of filthy music. Quentin reached up and gave him his hand, wrapping it around his cock and stroking him slowly, pre-come dripping down Eliot’s shaft and making him slick. Pleasure coiled around Eliot’s heart, making him whimper, Quentin’s tongue pressing into him as he worked him up and back down again in a steady rhythm.

“I love your mouth,” Eliot babbled, his legs beginning to tremble, his hands falling down and bunching up the quilt in tight fists. “I love your tongue your hands your dick.” He laughed, tears welling in his eyes. “I fucking love everything about you. You make me feel so good, baby. You know that? Do you know… do you…”

Quentin moaned, his tongue going still. “I can feel you trembling,” he said down between Eliot’s legs. “Your dick is so hard.” He gave it a single, languid stroke. “Want you to come for me.”

He arched up off the bed when Quentin dived back in, his tongue a live wire straight to Eliot’s dick, hand working him steadily closer to his release. His hips worked on instinct, rocking against Quentin’s tongue and up into the tight embrace of his fist, his whole body drawing tight, his mind going blank as he let himself tip right over the edge.

Eliot spurted all over his belly and up to his chest, dripping down onto Quentin’s fingers, the world in his vision going hazy, his body thrumming with static as he went soft in Quentin’s hand. Eliot whined when he pulled away, could hear Quentin sucking each of his fingers into his mouth with a moan, then the unmistakable sound of him stroking himself quickly, his breath coming out in desperate little puffs.

“Don’t… you dare,” Eliot laughed, reaching for him blindly.

“What,” Quentin breathed. “El…”

“Don’t you dare.” Eliot let a sound slip out of his chest that might have been a growl. “My husband… is going to get up here… right now… and jack off into my mouth. Or we are getting a divorce.”

Quentin’s laugh rolled from his mouth and straight into Eliot’s heart, and Eliot let out a contented sigh as Quentin made his way up the length of his slack and sated body to straddle his chest. “Better?” Quentin smiled, his mouth hanging open, his sweat-damp hair sticking up wildly where it wasn’t clinging to his brow.

Eliot ran his hands up the backs of his thighs to grip the soft flesh of his ass. “So much better, sweetheart,” he purred, his eyes locked on the space where Quentin was taking himself in hand. “That’s it, baby. Come for daddy.”

Quentin laughed, the sound coming out all air. “You’re ridiculous, you know that? God, I fucking love you.”

Eliot smirked, sticking out his tongue and fixing his eyes on Quentin’s face, watching the pleasure wash over him like an epiphany. Eliot touched him in every space he could get his hands, coaxing him ever-closer to that edge, whispering love, whispering his name, deciding in the end that they were one and the same.

Quentin tossed his head back when he came, crying out as his body trembled and his release spurted hotly all over Eliot’s waiting tongue, his lips, his chin, drops falling like confetti across the curve of his cheek. Eliot craned his neck to lap at his slit until Quentin was entirely spent, licking at his lips to get every last drop as Quentin collapsed in a heap at his side.

They lay there covered in each other without words as their breathing slowly returned to normal, bodies thrumming in the afterglow. Quentin settled his head down onto Eliot’s chest, and Eliot wrapped him in his arms with a sigh.

“This is nice,” Eliot said, eyes falling shut, Quentin’s fingers tracing patterns into his skin.

Quentin pressed his lips to Eliot’s chest. “So nice. Maybe, um…” He shifted, and Eliot could practically hear the gears turning in his mind. “I don’t know.”

“No. Hey.” Eliot gave him a nudge. “Say it, baby. You know you can say anything.”

Quentin pulled back, propping himself up on an elbow, his face flushed and uncertain. “I was just thinking… this place. It’s…”

“In danger of collapsing onto our naked bodies at any second?”

“Well, yeah… but it’s, I don’t know… when I think of home…”

Eliot brushed the hair out of his eyes, feeling something that he couldn’t even hope to name. “I know, my love. I feel the same.”

“So what if we stayed?”

Eliot’s chest tightened a little more by the second. “Q…”

“I’m just saying.” He let out a heavy sigh and rested his chin on Eliot’s chest. “Do you really wanna go back?”

Eliot gave him a soft look. “You can’t miss therapy.”

“El.” Quentin said his name like a prayer. “This is our home.”

“Baby…” The look in Quentin’s eyes made Eliot want to give him each of Fillory’s moons, and its sun, and the entire fucking universe if it would make him happy. “Come here. Sit with me.”

They pulled themselves up and sat across from one another on the bed. Eliot took Quentin’s hands in his, pressing a kiss to the back of each one. “Do you know why this place was our home?”

Quentin gave him a look that Eliot couldn’t place. Sorrow or love. Eliot settled on both. “I want you to tell me,” he said after a moment.

Eliot gave his hands a squeeze. “We made it a home, Q. We did. Together. With our family.”

Quentin’s lips trembled just a little. “El…”

“It could have been anywhere. The quest decided it was this place.” Eliot reached across the space between them, trailing his knuckles down Quentin’s cheek, wishing he could cut his soul wide open just to show Quentin the shape of his love. To help him understand. “You’re my home, Q. Where we lay our heads doesn’t matter, as long as you’re beside me.”

Slowly, a smile spread itself over Quentin’s face, and Eliot felt it in his chest, in all the chambers of his heart. “That might just be your best line yet.”

Barely suppressing a laugh, so full of love he could hardly believe it, Eliot shrugged. “What can I say. I’m spectacularly smooth.”

Quentin stared at him for a handful of seconds before crawling into his lap, and Eliot wrapped him in his arms with a sigh. Quentin kissed the underside of his jaw, his neck, nuzzling into his shoulder. “You’re right, you know,” he said after a moment of silence. “But it makes me sad. Seeing it this way.”

“Then we’ll fix it,” Eliot said without hesitation, kissing the top of Quentin’s head. “We’ll make it beautiful again, come here whenever we want. We have magic and time and each other, my love.”

Eliot could feel Quentin smiling against his neck. “Yeah, we do,” he said, and Eliot drew him nearer, soaking in the warmth of him deeply.

Outside, birdsong, the rustling of leaves, the distant trickling of a stream that Eliot knew like the backs of his own hands. Inside, Quentin’s breathing, Quentin’s skin. Together, the familiar heartbeat of home, like a promise from some other life rising up to meet them. A promise of the future reaching out its hand.

Quentin pulled back, taking Eliot’s face in his hands, kissing him softly, languidly, fingers tangling in his hair, happy little noises passing between them. And when Quentin broke the kiss he was smiling, a familiar glint in his eyes. “We’re taking the quilt with us when we go back, right?”

Eliot laughed, heart swelling, swelling, bursting open and taking flight. “My first vow as your lawfully wedded husband is going to be to fuck you on this quilt every night for the rest of this lifetime... and possibly the next.”

Quentin’s smile was so bright then, Eliot thought he might just burn. “Yeah,” he said. “I like the sound of that.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So. This is it??? I can't believe that... this is it. I've been living with this fic since last summer, and I can honestly say the process of writing it and sharing it with y'all has helped my heart so much. Giving them this happy ending is something that I needed to do for myself, but something that I know so many of you also needed, and if it's helped even one other person feel even a tiny bit better, then I'd say all this time spent has been more than worth it.
> 
> Thank you from the bottom of my heart to everyone who has left comments and kudos and generally been so lovely during this entire posting process. I still have a whole lotta fic for these two left in me, so don't expect it to stop anytime soon 💖


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